


LINCOLN 

SELECTIONS 

HAMILTON 




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Book. 



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CilEUilCill DEPOSm 



General Editor 

LINDSAY TODD DAMON, A.B. 

Professor of English in Brown University 



ADDISON — Sir Roger de Coverley Papers — Abbott 

ADDISON AND STEELE— Sf/e^rtores from The Taller and The Spec- 

taLOT — ABBOTT 

^NEID OF VIRGIL— Allinson 

AUSTEN — Pride and Prejudice 

BROWNING — Selected Poews— Reynolds 

BUILDERS OF DEMOCRACY— Cheenlaw 

BUNYAN — The Pilgrim's Progress — Latham 

BURKE— Speec.i on Conciliation with Collateral Readings — Wabd. 

BURNS — Selected Poems and C ARLYLE — Essau on riurns — MabSH 

CHAUCER — Selections — Greenlaw 

COLERIDGE — The Ancient Mariner 

LOWELL— Fistora of Sir Laun/al ] '^ vol.— MooDT 

COOPER — The Last of the Mohicans — Lewis 

COOPER — The Spy — Damon 

DANA — Tiio Years Before the Mast — Westcptt 

DEFOE — RoMnson Crusoe — Hastings 

Democracy Today — Gauss 

DE OUINCEY — Joan of Arc and Selections — Moody 

DE OUINCEY — The Flight of a Tartar Trrftf— FRENCH. 

DICKENS — A Christmas Carol, etc. — Broadus 

DICKENS — A Tale of Two C«ics— Baldwin 

DICKENS — David Copperficld — Baldwin 

DRYDEN — Palamon and Arcite — Cock 

EMERSON — Essays and Addresses — Heydrick 

English Poem.. — From Pope, Gray, Goldsmith, Coleridge, Btkon, 

Macatjlay, Arnold, ujid others — Scudder 
English Popular Ballads — Hart 
Essays — English and American — Alden 
Familiar Letters — Greenlaw 
FRANKLIN — Autobiography — Griffin 
French Short Stories — SCHWEIKERT 
GASKELL (Mrs.) — Cranford — Hancock 
GEORGE ELIOT — Silas Marner — Hancock 
GEORGE ELIOT— r/ze Mill on the Floss — Ward 
GOLDSMITH— r;je Vicar of Wakefield— Momoti 
HAWTHORNE— T/je House of the Seven Gables — HerricK 
HAWTHORNE— Twice- roZd Tales — Herrick and Brxteke 
HUGHES — Tom Broun's School Days — de Mille 
IRVING— L^/e of GoldsmUh—KBAVP 
IRVING— r/?e Sketch Book— Khapp 
VRVING — Tales of a Traveller — and parts or The Sketch Book — Kbapf 



5rifp Hake SttgltBli (SUtxBmsr-tonmmt^ 

■ ■llllll »^— — — — — ^M. - lll.ll f i i wi w 

LAMB — Essays of Elia — Benedict 
LONGFELLOW — Narralite Poems — Powell 
LOWELL — Vision of Sir Launfal — See Coleridge 
MAGAULAY — Essays on Addison and Johnson — Newcomer 
MACAULAY — Essays on Clive and Hastings — Newcomer 

MAGAULAY — Goldsmith. Frederic the Great. Madame D' Arblay—NEVT' 

comer 
MACAULAY — Essays on Milton and Addison — Newcomer 
MILTON — U Allegro, II Penseroso, Comus, and Lycidas — Neilson 
MILTON — Paradise Lost. Books I and II — Farley 
•Old Testament Narratives — Rhodes 
One Hundred Narrative Poems — Teter 
PALGRAVE — Golden Treasury — Newcomer 
PARKMAN — The Oregon Trail — Macdonald 
POE — Poems and Tales, Selected— Ne-wcomer 

FOPE— Homer's Iliad, Books I, VI, XXII, XXIV— CBESSV AND MOODY 
READE — The Cloister and The Hearth — de Millb 
RUSKIN — Sesame and Lilies — LiNN 
Russian Short Stories — SCHWEIKERT 
SCOTT — Imnhoe — Simonds 
SCOTT — Quentin Durward — SiMONDS 
SCOTT— Lady of the Lake — Moody 

SCOTT— Lay of the Last Minstrel — Moody and Willard 
SCOTT — Marmion — Moody and Willard 
. SHAKSPERE — The Neilson Edition — Edited by W. A. Neilson, 

As You Lite It Macbeth 

Hamlet Midsumjner-Nighrs Dream 

Henry V Romeo and Juliet 

Julius Caesar The Tempest 

Twelfth Night 

SHAKSPERE — Merchant of Venice — Lovett 

SOUTHEY — Life of Nelson — Westcott 

STEVENSON — Inland Voyage and Travels with a Donr.ey — Leonard 

STEVENSON — Kidnapped — Leonard 

STEVENSON — Treasure Island — Broadus 

TENNYSON— 5eiecred Poe?7W — Reynolds 

TENNYSON — Tlie Princess — Copeland 

THOREAU — Walden — Bowman 

THACKERAY — Henry Esmond — fhelps 

THACKERAY — English Htmorists — Cunliffe and Watt 

Three American Poems — The Raven, Snow-Bound, Miles Standtsh— 
Greever 

Types of the Short Story — Heydrick 

Washington, Webster, Lincoln — Denney 

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©Ij? Hakje SttgltBlj CflksBtrfi 



. REVISED EDITION V,'ITH HELPS TO STUDY 

SELECTIONS 

FROM THE 

Writings of Abraham Lincoln 



EDITED FOR SCHOOL USE 
BY 

J. G. DE ROULHAC HAMILTON 

KENAN PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AND GOVERNMENT 
THE UNIVERSITY OF ^ORTH CAROLINA 



SCOTT, FORESMAN AND COMPANY 
CHICAGO NEW YORK 



E ^5-T 



Copyright 1922 

BY 

Scott, Foresman and Company 



FEB 1 6 1922 



©nLAS54637 



PREFACE 

A close student of Lincoln for many years past, I 
have in the preparation of this volume made use of all 
the standard works on the subject, and have, in addi- 
tion, read several hundred short articles which toucli 
his life, character, personality, and writings. As a 
result my obligations are so varied that it is an utter 
impossibility to acknowledge them all individually in 
any reasonable limits of space. 

I wish, however, to acknowledge my deep indebted- 
ness for permission to use certain of the selections to 
Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons, publishers of the Consti- 
tutional Edition of Lincoln's Writings and of The Writ- 
ings of Carl Scliurz; to the Century Company for simi- 
lar permission to use Abraham Lincoln's Complete 
Works (edited by Nicolay and Hay) ; to Messrs. Charles 
Scribner's Sons for permission to include a selection 
from Mary R. S. Andrews's The Perfect Tribute, and 
to the Macmillan Company for an extract from Ida M. 
Tarbell's Life of Abraham Lincoln, 

I am under heavy obligations to my wife for invalu- 
able assistance in making the selections, in the editorial 
work, and in the preparation of the manuscript. 

J. G. de R. H. 

Chapel Hill, N. C. 
December, 1921 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preface 3 

Bibliographical Note 10 

Introduction 11 

Chronology • 25 

I. Growth and Training 29 

Lincoln's Autobiography of 1860 29 

Announcement of Candidacy for Legislature 40 

Address to the People of Sangamon County 41 

Political Views in 1836. • • 4T 

Letter to Robert Allen 48 

Protest Against Slavery 50 

Letter to Mrs. O. H. Browning 51 

Letter to W. G. Anderson 55 

Letter to Miss Mary Speed 56 

Letter to Williamson Durley 59 

Letter to William H. Herndon 62 

Letter to John M. Clayton 63 

Notes for a Law Lecture 64 

Letter to John D. Johnston 66 

Letter to John D. Johnston 68 

Letter to John D. Johnston 69 

IL Fighting the Extension of Slavery 73 

The Nature and Objects of Government 76 

Letter to John M. Palmer 80 

The Peoria Speech 82 

5 



6 CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Letter to I. Codding. • 131 

Letter to George Robertson 132 

Letter to Joshua F. Speed 134 

Letter to J. A. Brittenham 140 

Speech in Reply to Senator Douglas at Springfield . . . 143 

The Springfield Speech 158 

Letter to Henry Asbury 171 

Lincoln's Autobiography of 1858 173 

Definition of Democracy 172 

Letter to J. N. Brown 172 

Letter to H. D. Sharpe 174 

Letter to H. L. Pierce and Others 175 

The Columbus Speech 178 

Letter to J. W. Fell 212 

Lincoln's Autobiography of 1850 212 

The Cooper Union Speech 216 

III. Saving the Uxion 243 

Letter to William S. Speer 244 

Letter to William H. Seward 245 

Letter to William H. Seward 245 

Letter to John A. Gilmer 246 

Letter to Thurlow Weed, 251 

Farewell Address at Springfield 252 

Address in Independence Hall, Philadelphia 252 

First Inaugural Address 255 

Seward's "Some Thoughts for the President's Consider- 
ation" 267 



CONTEXTS 7 

PAGE 

Reply to Seward ". 368 

Reply to a Committee from the Virginia Convention. .270 

Letter to Reverdy Johnson 273 

Letter to Gustavus V. Fox 274 

Letter to Colonel Ellsworth's Parents 275 

Message to Congress in Special Session 276 

Letter to General John C. Fremont 295 

Letter to O. H. Browning 296 

Letter to Maj or Ramsey 299 

Extract from Annual Message to Congress 300 

Letter to General David Hunter 307 

Letter to General George B. McClellan 308 

Special Message to Congress 309 

Letter to Henry J. Rajnuond 312 

Letter to General George B. McClellan 312 

Telegram to R. Yates and . William Butler 315 

Proclamation Revoking General Hunter's Order 315 

Appeal to the Border State Representatives 318 

Letter to Reverdy Johnson 321 

Letter to Cuthbert Bullitt 322 

Letter to August Belmont 325 

Letter to Florace Greeley 327 

Reply to a Chicago Committee 329 

Telegram to General George B. McClellan 333 

Letter to General Carl Schurz 334 

Order for Sabbath Observance 336' 

Letter to General N. P. Banks 337 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Letter to General Carl Schurz 338 

Extract from Annual Message to Congress 340 

Letter to William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase 356 

The Emancipation Proclamation 356 

Letter to General John A. McClernand 359 

Reply to the Workingmen of Manchester 360 

Letter to General Joseph Hooker 363 

Letter to General William Rosecrans 364 

Letter to Governor Horatio Seymour 366 

Proclamation for a National Fast Day 367 

Telegram to General Joseph Hooker 369 

Telegram to General Joseph Hooker 369 

Telegram to General Joseph Hooker 370 

Letter to General U. S. Grant 370 

Letter to James H. Hackett 371 

Letter to James C. Conkling 372 

Letter to James C. Conkling 373 

Letter to Salmon P. Chase 378 

Proclamation for Thanksgiving 379 

Letter to James H. Hackett 380 

The Gettysburg Address 382 

Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction 383 

Extract from Ahnual Message to Congress 387 

Letter to Salmon P. Chase 394 

Letter to Salmon P. Chase 39 1 

Letter to Michael Hahn 395 

Letter to A. G. Hodges 396 



CONTEXTS 9 

PAGE 

Letter to General U. S. Grant 399 

Order to General John A. Dix 401 

Memorandum , 403 

Letter to Mrs. Blxby 401- 

Extract from Annual Message to Congress 404 

Second Inaugural Address 411 

Letter to Thurlow Weed 414 

Memorandum on Terms of Peace ,41G 

Telegram to General U. S. Grant 417 

Last Public Address 418 

Letter to General Van Alen 4x?4 



BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 

Any attempt at a complete Lincoln bibliography is 
impossible^, and of course, in a work of this sort is un- 
necessary. No man in American history has had so 
much attention devoted to his life as Lincoln, and the 
list of books and articles relating to him grows without 
any noticeable diminution. It may, however, be help- 
ful to those desiring to study him in greater detail to 
mention here a small number of works suitable for ref- 
erence purposes. 

The standard biography is Nicolay and Hay's Life of 
Abraham Lincoln, in ten large volumes. This work 
deals with the history of the period in some detail and 
is biased and partisan. Tarbell's Life of Abraham Lin- 
coln is very satisfactory in every way. Herndon's Life 
of Lincoln contains a great deal of valuable and inter- 
esting material bearing on his early life, as does also 
Lamon's Life of Lincoln. Of the shorter biographies 
Hapgood's Lincoln, the Man of the People, in the judg- 
ment of the writer, stands easily first. Other valuable 
works are Putnam's Abraham Liticoln; Whitney's Life 
of Lincoln; Lord Charnwood's Abraham Lincoln; Rice's 
Reminiscences of Lincoln; and Rothschild's Lincoln, 
Master of Men. Lowell and Schurz wrote essays on 
Lincoln which are excellent interpretations and which 
will prove very helpful to the student of Lincoln. 

This list is in no sense exhaustive; rather it must be 
noted that others almost as satisfactory could be pre- 
pared without including any of the works mentioned. 

10 



INTEODUCTION 

This little volume of selections from Lincoln's writ- 
ings is prepared with a double purpose. Primarily it is 
intended to serve as the basis for the work of classes in 
English literature, or as collateral reading in American 
history, but it is hoped that it may also interest those 
who wish to find, gathered in convenient form, the more 
important and characteristic speeches, letters, and state 
papers of the great President. 

I confess to a strong prejudice against the rather 
common practice of including in such a collection as this 
portions of a speech or letter, isolated from their con- 
text. Believing that this tends to defective instruction 
and careless study, and that it is unjust both to author 
and reader, I have given the full text of all the docu- 
ments included, with exceptions in the cases of one 
speech, of one letter, and of the annual messages. In 
the case of the latter^ I have omitted the routine portions, 
and the extracts given are complete units in themselves. 
In the running story which accompanies the text there 
are also occasional brief quotations for the purpose of 
illustration. 

I have endeavored to include in the collection not only 
the best known of Lincoln's writings but also those 
others which best illustrate his growth and development, 
his personality, his political ideals, and his relation to 
important events and movements in American history. 
Thus, there will be found those papers and addresses 
which are most noted for the beauty and power of their 
language and the logic and strength of their thought; 
others significant for their hard common sense; and 

11 



12 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

still others which are illuminating for the study of the 
man or his period. 

Of his great political speeches I have included the 
Peoria, the Springfield, the Columbus, and the Cooper 
Union addresses, which, as Colonel Watterson says, con- 
tain his entire political philosophy. I have, however, 
omitted the debates with Douglas of 1858. In addition, 
I have thought it v/ell to include a number of minor 
speeches, not so well known, which indicate the direc- 
tion and character of his growth, the heart of the man, 
or the formulation of an opinion or policy. 

In the case of the letters, I have been guided by 
somewhat the same idea. Every kind of letter he wrote 
is represented here. They have been selected with even 
more care than the speeches, for the light they throw 
upon Lincoln's character and personality; and they 
range from the humorous and keenly satirical to the 
simple and wonderfully impressive letter to Mrs. Bixb3^ 

I believe that everything necessary to a full under- 
standing of the man and the policies and principles for 
which he stood has been included. 

Since the selections contain the essential outline of 
Lincoln's life in his own words, I have made no attempt 
in this introduction to tell again the story. The running 
interpretation of the documents will, I believe, furnish 
all additional detail necessary to their full understand- 
ing. 

Three great reasons make the study of Lincoln's writ- 
ings worth while. In the first place, uneven as they are, 
they contain masterpieces of English literature which in 
themselves, as examples of effective reasoning and pres- 
entation, fully repay study. A second reason is to be 
found in the revelation they furnish of a man who is 
one of the great figures of world history. Knowledge 
of his writings develops an intellectual intimacy with a 
man who was, in his later years at least, one of the lofti- 
est souls of history, but one which nevertheless never 



INTRODUCTION 13 

lost its contact and kinship with the minds, hearts, and 
souls of the mass of men ; which never found difficulty 
in its instinctive understanding of the thoughts, hopes, 
and aspirations of the average man. Finally, these 
papers throw the strongest possible light on the political 
events of their period of American history, and in that 
light the study of history is simplified and humanized. 
The power and beauty of Lincoln's writings, partic- 
ularly remarkable when the lack of opportunity for con- 
ventional training is recalled, constitute one of the great- 
est personal achievements of his life. At an early age 
he set himself to work deliberately to acquire mastery 
of the power of clear expression. He thus described 
what he did: 

"When a mere child I used to get irritated when any- 
body talked to me in a way I could not understand. I 
do not think I ever got angry at anything else in my 
life; but that always disturbed my temper, and has ever 
since. I can remember going to my little bedroom, after 
hearing the neighbors talk of an evening with my father, 
and spending no small i3art of the night walking up and 
down trying to make out what was the exact meaning 
of some of their, to me, dark sayings. 

"I could not sleep when I got on such a hunt for an 
idea until I had caught it; and when I thought I had 
got it^ I was not satisfied until I had put it in language 
plain enough, as I thought, for any boy to comprehend. 
This was a kind of passion with me, and it has stuck by 
me; for I am never easy now, when I am handling a 
thought, till I have bounded it north, and bounded it 
south, and bounded it east, and bounded it west." 

It was in consequence of this rigid self-training that 
his writings are all marked by terseness and simplicity 
of statement. In all he wrote and all he said, he sought 
to be persuasive, and to his mind that meant, above all 
things, to be clear. He dealt always with essentials 



14 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

which he knew thoroughly. In preparation for a speech 
he saturated himself with his subject, studying it from 
all sides, handling it, and living with it night and day. 
As he phrased it once to his law-partner, Herndon, when 
deep in the preparation of a case, "If I can clean this 
case of technicalities and get it properly to the jury, 
I'll win it." All his writings show his purpose of strip- 
ping away the technicalities and getting the case prop- 
erly to the jury. He was not a quick thinker; rather 
he thought slowly, even with difficulty, but profoundly, 
and with the information available, accurately. Above 
all else he sought accurate thinking as a necessary 
preliminary to clear and persuasive expression. Thus, 
when finally he came to the discussion of the question, 
he could state his propositions with perfect exactness 
and in a ver}^ compact way. 

This power of compression enabled him to state the 
vital point of his argument in a few words or sentences 
which impressed themselves indelibly on the minds of his 
hearers. A remarkable instance of this is found in his 
Springfield speech of 1858 where he stated his final 
conclusion on the slavery question in these words ; 

"A house divided against itself cannot stand. I be- 
lieve this government cannot endure half slave and half 
free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do 
not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will 
cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all 
the other." 

Along with compactness and clarity of expression 
went systematic building up of his argument, readiness 
in apt comparisons, often lighted up with keen wit, and 
relentless pursuit of an opponent's errors in fact or 
logic. 

How and where did Lincoln learn how to write is a 
question often asked. A clever and not wholly in- 
adequate answer is that he "learned to reason with 



INTRODUCTION 15 

Euclid and to feel and speak with the authors of the 
Bible." Really the whole truth is not far to seek. His 
purpose and his guide in expression which greatly in- 
fluenced his writing and speaking have been described. 
But, self-taught^ he had to have models. As has been 
frequently pointed out, he might, under different 
circumstances, have been familiar with the work of 
Bryant, Poe, Hawthorne, Emerson, Lowell, Whittier, 
Holmes, Longfellow, and Thoreau. There is no reason, 
however, to believe that he knew any of them. His 
models were of a different sort. As a boy, forming then 
rapidly the man, he read the Bible, J^ sop's Fables, 
Weems's Life of Washington, The Pilgrim's Progress, 
Robinson Crusoe, a small history of the United States, 
a volume of Indiana statutes, and Webster's spelling 
book. Later in life he acquired Blackstone's Com- 
mentaries and became familiar with Shakespeare. These 
were his textbooks. 

The contrast between this small list and the titles 
now within the reach and at the command of most young 
people is striking; and yet the contrast is one of size 
rather than of quality. Lincoln could hardly have had 
a higher average of quality in his library, and the very 
smallness of the collection, making every word precious, 
served to impress their form and thought upon his mind 
in a very striking way. In other words he not only, 
like any eager and intellectually curious boy, devoured 
them; he digested and assimilated them completely. 

All influenced him doubtless. From Weems's remark- 
able work of Action he drew his first hero-worship and 
possibly his first conscious devotion to the country his 
hero had so gloriously made and served. From the law 
books he acquired, doubtless, a part of his exactness and 
accuracy of statement, and possibly no small part of his 
power of logical organization and thinking. The in- 
fluence of iEsop's Fables is easily traced in his speeches 
as well as in the stories for which he was famous. All 



16 SELECTIONS FROxM LINCOLN 

of his stories M^ere in a sense allegorical. He never 
told one, at least in his speeches, which did not emphasize 
a point he wished to make. 

But of all these, the Bible and Shakespeare con- 
tributed the most to his style and his thought. The 
Bible began its impress when he was a mere child and 
it continued to make it all his life, becoming more 
marked in the seriousness of his later years. He never 
ceased to read it, and in the last year of his life, he 
wrote a close friend, "I am profitably engaged in read- 
ing the Bible. Take all of this book upon reason that 
you can and the balance upon faith, and you will live 
and die a better man." In all his writings his familiarity 
with it is apparent, not only in his frequent quotations 
and allusions, but possibly more in the form and flavor 
of his speech and the "high seriousness" which char- 
acterized his thought. Shakespeare, coming into his 
hands later in life, did not make so deep an impression. 

Lincoln's achievement thus described did not come all 
at once. In many of his early writings are touches of 
florid style, but he soon found that because these were 
not natural they were not effective, and, abandoning 
them, returned to his native simplicity, in which and 
through which in part he was to win fame. In American 
political literature he began a new era, setting a stand- 
ard which influenced profoundly not only that narrow 
field but the whole field of American literature. He 
began the movement toward simplicity that was in time 
to make the high-colored speeches and essays of Amer- 
ican politicians seem absurd in this country as well as 
abroad. His service here is one tliat should not be 
measured lightly. 

In most of his speeches and nearly all his letters he 
was perfectly natural. Popularly known as a humorist 
with rather a coarse strain of humor, little or none of 
this appears in his formal writings and little more in his 
letters. Nor was there in his speeches any straining 



INTRODUCTION 17 

for popular treatment. In his debates with Douglas, 
he was urged to treat his subject in this way, and re- 
plied, "The occasion is too serious, the issues are too 
grave. I do not seek applause, or to arouse the people, 
but to convince them." 

In fact, his speeches are marked by reserve and 
dignity, but they are seasoned with an original and 
homely flavor that carried them direct to the mind and 
heart of the hearer or reader. And this was his purpose. 
There is nothing to indicate any purpose, at least in his 
maturer years, of making "literature." He acquired 
through close study of excellent models a sense of form 
that became almost instinctive, but, after all, beauty of 
form was to him, like clarity, chiefly an agency to 
persuasion. 

In his writings are evident the deep conviction which 
moved him and an essential honesty of purpose. He 
was contemptuous of tricks of public speaking and scorn- 
ful of the "specious and fantastic arguments by which 
a man m^ay prove that a horse-chestnut is a chestnut 
horse," and of "sophistical contrivances groping for 
some middle ground between right and wrong." Honest 
in purpose, he consistently practiced honesty of method 
and expression, which made courts and juries believe in 
him, and, more important still, caught the ear and atten- 
tion of that great jury, the people, to which he addressed 
himself. With all his conviction and "energy of honest 
directness," he was not a person unable to change an 
opinion. Taxed once with such a change, he said, "Yes, 
I have, and I don't think much of a man who isn't wiser 
today than he was yesterday." In this connection 
Lowell aptly says, "The foolish and the dead alone 
never change their opinion." 

Another explanation of Lincoln's power lies in his 
possession of a keen, profound, and sympathetic knowl- 
edge of the human mind and heart. Part of this was 
sheer instinct ; more, perhaps, was the result of long and 



18 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

wide experience with men, beginning with those of an 
almost primitive society. He knew the average man 
well, both as to his mind and his heart, and to the 
average man most of his arguments were directed. They 
lost nothing from the fact that they were always ad- 
dressed to the intelligence of men rather than to their 
prejudices, passions, and ignorance. They gain 'tre- 
mendously in the later years in the seeming invitation 
of them all to come and reason together. There is in 
them no pride of self or pride of opinion. Here as 
elsewhere, as Lowell says, Lincoln's "I" always sounds 
like "we.'* 

It must not, however, be supposed that he failed in 
conception of his own powers and his own place. Ready 
always to sink all thought of self in a great cause, he 
knew when to assume the dignity of his place and posi- 
tion. The reply to Seward's famous "Thoughts for the 
President's Consideration" is an illustration of this. 
Upon occasion, too, he could be severe, as in the letters 
to McClellan and Hooker. But in spite of these cases, 
the impression grows as study of him continues, that 
infinite patience and sweetness of spirit were among his 
most characteristic possessions. 

The lives of few Americans have offered so much 
opportunity for fascinating and profitable study as that 
of Lincoln. That this is so is proved by the great flood 
of Lincoln literature which has been poured out since 
1865, and also by the fact that he is a familiar figure, 
not only to an extraordinary number of Americans, but 
also to thousands in other lands, who have come to know 
him as they know no other American. 

But it is well to note that, partly on account of the 
circumstances of his death, and partly on account of the 
peculiar relation he bore to the nation, a semi-mythical 
Lincoln has grown up in the popular mind. In this 
misrepresentation Lincoln has suffered. A man de- 
ified is apt in time to be robbed of all that makes 



INTRODUCTION 19 

him akin to mere mortals^ and in that very kinship, 
that identification with the mass of Americans, lies a 
large part of Lincoln's greatness. He gains nothing in 
the ascription to him in this way of wisdom more than 
human, of goodness that might well be called divine. To 
no ojie more than Lincoln himself would such a false 
portraiture have been unwelcome; to no one would it 
have seemed more misplaced. An American to the core, 
he found his greatest fame in representing the people 
from whom he was sprung. Their virtues, their ideals, 
were his, and, none the less, their faults. He was not, 
perhaps^ the wisest nor the best man America has pro- 
duced, but he v»^as bej^ond all doubt the most humanly 
representative. It is no error to call him, as did Lowell, 
the first American. It was this very fact, this identifica- 
tion with the spirit of the nation, the likeness of his 
great human heart to the heart of the whole people, 
which gave him his peculiar greatness, which enabled 
him to fill, as no other man in our history could have 
filled, the presidential office in the period of greatest 
national stress. 

Much space and energy, not to mention ingenuity, 
have been spent in the effort to prove Lincoln marked 
from his youth as a child of Destiny. All the truth 
points to the contrary. Hundreds of Americans of 
equally humble origin and small opportunity have dis- 
played the equal of the ability displayed by Lincoln 
before his inauguration. Those well qualified to judge 
found in him no evidences of greatness. Stanton was 
associated with him in 1857 in a lawsuit and regarded 
him as "a low, cunning clown." Later he was to call 
him "the original gorilla," and wonder why Du Chaillu 
had gone all the way to Africa. He wrote Buchanan in 
1861 of Lincoln's "painful imbecility," and even after 
he became a member of Lincoln's cabinet is said to have 
informed a visitor, who presented some order from the 
President, that Lincoln was a "d — d fool." Lincoln's 



20 SELECTIONS FROJNI LINCOLN 

comment, thoroughly characteristic, exhibits what may 
justly be considered a part of his greatness; namely his 
power of humorous comprehension. "If Stanton/' said 
he, "said I was a d — d fool, then I must be one, for 
he is nearly always right and generally says what he 
means. I must step over and see him." Nor was the 
irascible and conceited Stanton alone in criticism; it 
was widespread. Charles Francis Adams, as late as 
1873, said that Lincoln, when he entered upon his duties 
as President, displayed "moral, intellectual, and execu- 
tive incompetency." This feeling is also expressed by 
the younger Charles Francis Adams in his biography of 
his father: "Seen in the light of subsequent events, it 
is assumed that Lincoln in 1865 was also the Lincoln of 
1861. Historically speaking, there can be no greater 
error. The President, who has since become a species 
of legend, was in March, 1861, an absolutely unknown, 
and by no means promising political quantity." 

Two sane and contemporary views of Lincoln furnish 
a good guide for the study of his life. John Lothrop 
Motley wrote his mother, "I venerate Abraham Lincoln 
exactly because he is the true, honest type of American 
democracy. There is nothing of the shabby-genteel, the 
would-be-but-couldn't-be fine gentleman; he is the great 
American Demos, honest, shrewd, homely, but through 
blunders struggling onward toward what he believes the 
right." Ward Lamon, Lincoln's intimate friend, wrote: 

"With all my affection, admiration, love, and venera- 
tion for Mr. Lincoln, I have never been one of those 
who believed him immaculate and incapable of making 
mistakes. He was human and in the nature of things 
was liable to err, yet he erred less often than other men. 
He had amiable weaknesses, some of which only the 
more ennobled him. 

"It is no compliment to his memory to smother from 
the closest scrutiny any of the acts of his life and trans- 



INTRODUCTION 21 

figure him by fulsome deification, so that his most inti- 
mate friends cannot recognize the Abraham Lincoln of 
former days. The truth of history requires that he 
should be placed on the record now that he is dead, as 
he stood before the people while living. Whatever mis- 
takes he made were made through the purest of motives. 
All his faults, all his amiable weaknesses, and all his 
virtues should be written on the same pages, so that the 
world may know the true man as his friends knew him." 
It is fairly evident that Lincoln did not exhibit, prior 
to 1861, the greatness that was later beyond dispute. 
The debates with Douglas were those of a clever, one 
may almost say supreme, politician, but they went no 
further. Lincoln at this time was essentially the poli- 
tician, albeit one of conviction, and while he did not 
play with principles, he frequently juggled ^vith men. 
The debates, it is true, were sincere, but sincerity, if 
rare, is not greatness. The war made Lincoln great, 
not because it made him anew, but because it gave his 
nature opportunity for expansion, and, still more, be- 
cause of the discipline it gave his character. All his 
qualities, save his honesty, needed the purification, which 
the furnace of war was to effect, to develop the new 
Lincoln, far different from the old and yet always the 
same. The new Lincoln had the same keen, almost 
intuitive, knowledge of men, but was softened by a 
deeper and tenderer sympathy. The beautiful letter to 
Mrs. Bixby, for example, so natural from the Lincoln of 
1864, could not have been penned by the Lincoln of 
1861. And so we find the same qualities of leadership, 
guided now by a new tact, and the same devotion to a 
cause, strengthened now by a loftier purpose and a 
willingness to endure personal sacrifice — if need be, to 
offer himself upon the altar of his country. This change 
is clearly to be seen in a contrast of the closing words of 
his two inaugural addresses. The Lincoln of 1861 could 
say with feeling: 



22 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

"I am loath to close. We are not enemies^ but friends. 
We must not be enemies. Though jDassion may have 
strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The 
mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle- 
field and patriot grave to every living heart and hearth- 
stone all over this broad land, vi^ill yet swell the chorus 
of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, 
by the better angels of our nature." 

But only the Lincoln of 1864 could say with the depth 
and feeling developed under the stern discipline of war: 

"The Almighty has his own purposes. 'Woe unto the 
world because of offenses ! for it must needs be that 
offenses come ; but woe to that man by whom the offense 
cometh.' If we shall suppose that American slavery is 
one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, 
must needs come, but which, having continued through 
His appointed time. He now wills to remove, and that He 
gives to both North and South this terrible war, as the 
woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we 
discern therein any departure from those divine at- 
tributes which the believers in a living God always 
ascribe to Him.^ Fondly do we hope — fervently do we 
pray — that this mighty scourge of war may speedily 
pass away. Yet if God wills that it continue until all 
the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and 
fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until 
every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by 
another drawn with the sword, as was said three thou- 
sand years ago, still it must be said, 'The judgments of 
the Lord are true and righteous altogether.' 

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with 
firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, 
let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up 
the nation's wounds ; to care for him who shall have 
borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan — 



INTRODUCTION 23 

to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and 
lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations." 

The study of his life and words leads to the conviction 
that in his heart, rather than in his brain, is to be found 
the secret of this development. Indeed there is to be 
found the explanation of his real relation to the nation's 
history, and the place he holds in the affections of his 
countrymen. Regardless of war with the Southern 
states, to him all Americans, North, South, East, and 
West, were his kindred and fellow-countrymen. His 
heart held room for all and felt with all. Maurice 
Thompson, a Confederate soldier, has aptly given ex- 
pression to this thought, saying: 

"He was the Southern mother, leaning forth 

At dead of night to hear the cannon roar. 

Beseeching God to turn the cruel North 

And break it that her son might come once more ; 

He was New England's maiden, pale and pure. 

Whose gallant lover fell on Shiloh's plain. 

He was the mangled body of the dead ; 

He, writhing, did endure 

Wounds and disfigurement and racking pain, 

Gangrene and amputation, all things dread." 

It is fitting that the man who occupies Lincoln's place 
in American history and in the affections of the Ameri- 
can people should not have sprung from one stock or one 
section. Born in the South of Southern and Northern 
ancestry, reared in the West and filled with the essen- 
tials of Western political democracy and nationalism, 
he had something of each of these three great sections 
into which the country was then divided and was in 
personality representative of each, though less so of 
the North than of the South and West. This kinship 
is eloquently expressed by Henry Grady: 

"From the union of these Northern and Southern 



24 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

colonists^, from the straightening of their purposes and 
the crossing of their blood, slowly perfecting through a 
century, came he who stands as the first American, the 
first who comprehended within himself all the strength 
and gentleness, all the majesty and grace of this re- 
public — Abraham Lincoln. 

"He was the sum of Puritan and Cavalier, for in his 
ardent nature were fused the virtues of both, and in the 
depths of his great soul the faults of both were lost. 
He was greater than Puritan, greater than Cavalier, in 
that he was American, and that in his homely form 
were first gathered the vast and thrilling forces of his 
ideal government — charging it with such tremendous 
meaning and so elevating it above human suffering that 
martyrdom, though infamously aimed, came as a fitting 
crown to a life consecrated from the cradle to human 
libertj^" 

Lincoln is not only the miracle of the great man, a 
miracle which constantly puzzles the world afresh ; he is 
the best example of the American miracle. American to 
the core, he owed little or nothing to the Old World 
directly, nothing beyond the common heritage of Ameri- 
cans. Lowell might well say: 

"People of sensitive organizations may well be 
shocked, but we are glad that in this our true war of in- 
dependence, which is to free us forever from the Old 
World, we have at the head of affairs a man whom 
America made, as God made Adam out of the very earth, 
unancestried, unprivileged, unknown, to show us how 
much truth, how much magnanimity, and how much 
statecraft wait the call of opportunity in simple man- 
hood when it believes in the justice of God and the 
worth of Man." 



CHRONOLOGY OF LINCOLN'S LIFE AND WRITINGS 

1809 February 12, born near Hodgensville, Hardin 

(now La Rue) County, Kentucky. 
1816 His family moved to Gentry ville, Indiana. 

1818 His mother, Nancy Hanks Lincoln, died. 

1819 His father remarried. 
1826 Attended school. 

1828 Made trip to New Orleans on a flatboat. - 

1829 Moved to a clearing on Sangamon River, near 

Decatur, Illinois. 

1831 Made second trip to New Orleans on a flatboat. 

1832 Captain in the Black Hawk War. 
Unsuccessful candidate for legislature. 

1833 Storekeeper, postmaster, and surveyor. 

1834 Elected to legislature. 

1836 Reelected to legislature. 

Whig candidate for presidential elector. 

1837 Studied law and admitted to bar. 

1838 Reelected to legislature. 

1840 Whig candidate for presidential elector. 
1842 Married Mary Todd. 

1844 Canvassed state as a Whig candidate for presi- 
dential elector. 
1846 Elected to Congress. 
1849 Retired from Congress. 

1854 Elected to legislature. 
October 16, The Peoria Speech. 

1855 Candidate for United States Senator. 

1858 Nominated for Senate by Republican party. 
June 16, The Springfield Speech. 
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates: 
August 21, Ottawa. 
25 



26 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

August 27, Freeport. 
September 15, Jonesboro. 
September 18, Charleston. 
October 7, Galesburg. 
October 13, Quincy. 
October 15, Alton. 

1859 September 16, The Columbus Speech. 

1860 February 27, The Cooper Union Speech. 
May 18, Nominated for President. 
November 6, Elected President. 

1861 March 4, Inaugurated President. 
April 13, Fall of Fort Sumter. 
April 15, Call for troops. 

1862 September 22, Preliminary Emancipation Procla- 

mation. 

1863 January 1, Emancipation Proclamation. 
November 19, The Gettysburg Address. 
December 8, The Amnesty Proclamation. 
December 8, Gave outline of plan of reconstruc- 
tion. 

186i June 8, Renominated for President. 

November 8, Reelected President. 
1865 March 4<, The second inauguration. 

April 14, Mortally wounded. 

April 15, Died. 



SELECTIONS FEOM THE WRITINGS 
OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



"First purCj then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, 
full of mercy and good fruits, without partiaiUy and without 
hypocrisy." 



I 

GROWTH AND TRAINING 



I 

GROWTH AND TRAINING 

The important facts of Lincoln's life up to the time of his 
nomination for the Presidency are interestingly told in the fol- 
lowing autobiographical sketch, written at tlie request of a 
friend for use in the campaign of 1860. The sketch is an excel- 
lent example of his terse, compressed style of narration, giving 
every essential fact, and yet using scarcely an unnecessary 
word. This facility of narration is noticeable in his later 
speeches and was very effective, 

A UTOBIOGBAPHY 
[Written for the Campaign of 1860] 

Abraham Lincoln was born February 12, 1809, then 
in Hardin, now in the more recently formed county of 
La Rue, Kentucky. His father, Thomas, and grand- 
father, Abraham, were born in Rockingham County, 
Virginia, whither their ancestors had come from Berks 
County, Pennsylvania. His lineage has been traced no 
farther back than this."^ The family were originally 
Quakers, though in later times they have fallen away 
from the peculiar habits of that people. The grand- 
father, Abraham, had four brothers — Isaac, Jacob, John, 
and Thomas. So far as known, the descendants of 
Jacob and John are still in Virginia. Isaac went to a 
place near where Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennes- 
see join; and his descendants are in that region. 
Thomas came to Kentucky, and after many years died 
there, whence his descendants went to Missouri. Abra- 

* After Lincoln's death, research into his family history estab- 
lished the fact that he was descended from Samuel Lincoln, who 
came to New England in 1657. 

29 



"30 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

ham, grandfather of the subject of this sketch, came I 
Kentucky, and was killed by Indians about the ye 
1784. He left a widow, three sons, and two daughter. 
The eldest son, Mordecai, remained in Kentucky till lat 
in life, when he remoAed to Hancock County, lUinoi; 
where soon after he died, and where several of hi 
descendants still remain. The second son, Josiah, re 
moved at an early day to a place on Blue River, no"v 
within Hancock County, Indiana, but no recent infor 
mation of him or his family has been obtained. Tht 
eldest sister, Mary, married Ralph Crume, and some o: 
her descendants are now known to be in Breckinridge 
County, Kentucky. The second sister, Nancy, marriec 
William Brumfield^ and her family are not known tc 
have left Kentucky, but there is no recent informatior ^ 
from them. Thomas, the youngest son, and father oi 
the present subject, by the early death of his father 
and very narrow circumstances of his mother, even in 
childhood was a wandering laboring-boy, and grew up 
literally without education. He never did more in the 
way of writing than to bunglingly write his own name. I 
Before he was grown he passed one year as a hired hand 
with his Uncle Isaac on Watauga, a branch of the 
Holston River. Getting back into Kentucky, and hav- 
ing reached this twenty-eighth year, he married Nancy 
Hanks — mother of the present subject — in the year 
1806. She also was born in Virginia, and relatives of 
hers of the name of Hanks, and of other names, now 
reside in Coles, in Macon^ and in Adams Counties, Illi- 
nois, and also in Iowa. The present subject has no 
brother or sister of the whole or half blood. He had a 
sister, older than himself, who was grown and married, 
but died many years ago, leaving no child; also a 
brother, younger than himself, who died in infancy. 
Before leaving Kentucky, he and his sister were sent, 
for short periods, to A B C schools, the first kept by 
Zachariah Riney, and the second by Caleb Hazel. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 31 

At this time his father resided on Knob Creek, on 
the road from Bardstown, Kentucky, to Nashville, Ten- 
nessee, at a point three or three and a half miles south 
or southwest of Atherton's Ferry, on the Rolling Fork. 
From this place he removed to what is now Spencer 
County, Indiana, in the autumn of 1816, Abrahfim 
then being in his eighth year. This removal was partly 

J on account of slavery, but chiefly on account of the dif- 
ficulty in land titles in Kentucky. He settled in an 

j unbroken forest, and the clearing away of surplus wood 
was the great task ahead. Abraham, though very 
young, was large of his age, and had an ax put into 
his hands at once; and from that till within his twenty- 

,1 third year he was almost constantly handling that most 
useful instrument — less, of course, in plowing and 
harvesting seasons. At this place Abraham took an early 
start as a hunter, which was never much improved 
afterwards. A few days before the completion of his 
eighth year, in the absence of his father, a flock of wild 
turkeys approached the new log cabin, and Abraham 
with a rifle-gun, standing inside, shot through a crack 
and killed one of them. He has never since pulled a 
trigger on any larger game. In the autumn of 1818 
his mother died ; and a year afterwards his father 
married Mrs. Sally Johnston, at Elizabethtown,. Ken- 
tucky, a widow with three children of her first mar- 
riage. She proved a good and kind mother to Abra- 
ham, and is still living in Coles County, Illinois. There 
were no children of this second marriage. His father's 
residence continued at the same place in Indiana till 
1830. While here Abraham went to A B C schools by 

littles, kept successively by Andrew Crawford, 

Sweeney, and Azel W. Dorsey. He does not remem- 
ber any other. The family of Mr. Dorsey now re- 
sides in Schuyler County, Illinois. Abraham now 
thinks that the aggregate of all his schooling did not 
amount to one year. He was never in a college or 



32 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

academy as a student, and never inside of a college or 
academy building till since he had a law license. What 
he has in the way of education he has picked up. 
After he was twenty-three and had separated from his 
father, he studied English grammar — imperfectly, of 
course, but so as to speak and write as well as he now 
does. He studied and nearly mastered the six books 
of Euclid since he was a member of Congress. He 
regrets his want of education, and does what he can to 
supply the want. In his tenth year he was kicked by a 
horse, and apparently killed for a time. When he was 
nineteen, still residing in Indiana, he made his first 
trip upon a flatboat to New Orleans. He was a hired 
hand merely, and he and a son of the owner, without 
other assistance, made the trip. The nature of part 
of the "cargo-load," as it was called, made it necessary 
for them to linger and trade along the sugar-coast; and 
one night they were attacked by seven negroes with in- 
tent to kill and rob them. They were hurt some in the 
melee, but succeeded in driving the negroes from the 
boat, and then "cut cable," "weighed anchor," and left. 
March 1, 1830, Abraham having just completed his 
twenty-first year, his father and family, with the fami- 
lies of the two daughters and sons-in-law of his step- 
mother, left the old homestead in Indiana and came to 
Illinois. Their mode of conveyance was wagons drawn 
by ox-teams, and Abraham drove one of the teams. 
They reached the county of Macon, and stopped there 
some time within the same month of March. His father 
and family settled a new place on the north side of the 
Sangamon River, at the junction of the timberland and 
prairie, about ten miles westerly from Decatur. Here 
they built a log cabin, into which they removed, and 
made sufficient of rails to fence ten acres of ground, 
fenced and broke the ground, and raised a crop of 
sown corn upon it the same year. These are, or are 
supposed to be, the rails about which so much is being 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 33 



said just now, though these are far from being the 
first or only rails ever made by Abraham. 

The sons-in-law were temporarily settled in other 
places in the county. In the autumn all hands were 
greatly afflicted with ague and fever, to which they had 
not been used, and by which they were greatly dis- 
couraged, so much so that thej^ determined on leaving 
the county. They remained, however, through the 
succeeding winter, which was the winter of the cele- 
brated "deep snow" of Illinois. During that winter 
Abraham, together with his stepmother's son, John D. 
Johnston, and John Hanks, yet residing in Macon 
County, hired themselves to Denton Offutt to take a 
flatboat from Beardstown, Illinois, to New Orleans; 
and for that purpose were to join him — Oifutt — at 
Springfield, Illinois, so soon as the snow should go off. 
When it did go off, which was about the first of March, 
1831, the county was so flooded as to make traveling by 
land impracticable, to obviate which difficulty they 
purchased a large canoe, and came down the Sangamon 
River in it. This is the time and manner of Abraham's 
first entrance into Sangamon County, They found 
Offutt at Springfield, but learned from him that he had 
failed in getting a boat at Beardstown. This led to 
their hiring themselves to him for twelve dollars per 
month each, and getting the timber out of the trees and 
building a boat at Old Sangamon town on the San- 
gamon River, seven miles northwest of Springfield, 
which boat they took to New Orleans, substantially 
upon the old contract. 

During this boat-enterprise acquaintance with Offutt, 
who was previously an entire stranger, he conceived a 
liking for Abraham, and believing he could turn him to 
account, he contracted with him to act as clerk for him, 
on his return from New Orleans, in charge of a store 
and mill at New Salem, then in Sangamon, now in 
Menard County. Hanks had not gone to New Orleans, 



34 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

but having a family, and being likely to be detained 
from home longer than at first expected, had turned 
back from St. Louis. He is the same John Hanks who 
now engineers the "rail enterprise" at Decatur, and is 
a first cousin to Abraham's mother. Abraham's father, 
with his own family and others mentioned, had, in pur- 
suance of their intention, removed from Macon to Coles 
County. John D. Johnston, the stepmother's son, 
went to them, and Abraham stopped indefinitely and 
for the first time, as it were, by himself at New Salem, 
before mentioned. This was in July, 1831. Here he 
rapidly made acquaintances and friends. In less than 
a year Offutt's business was failing — had almost failed 
— when the Black Hawk War of 1832 broke out. Abra- 
ham joined a volunteer company, and, to his own sur- 
prise, was elected captain of it. He says he has not 
since had any success in life which gave him so much 
satisfaction. He went to the campaign, served near 
three months, met the ordinary hardships of such an 
expedition, but was in no battle. He now owns, in 
Iowa, the land upon which his own warrants for the 
service * were located. Returning from the campaign, 
and encouraged by his great popularity among his im- 
mediate neighbors, he the same year van for the legis- 
lature, and was beaten — his own precinct, however, 
'casting its votes 277 for and 7 against him — and that, 
too, while he was an avowed Clay man, and the pre- 
cinct the autumn afterwards giving a majority of 115 
to General Jackson over Mr. Clay. This was the only 
time Abraham was ever beaten on a direct vote of the 
people. He was now without means and out of busi- 
ness, but was anxious to remain with his friends who 
had treated him with so much generosity, especially as 
he had nothing elsewhere to go to. He studied what 
he should do — thought of learning the blacksmith trade 

• Military service was paid for in warrants on the public 
lands. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 35 

■ — thought of trying to study law — rather thought he 
could not succeed at that without a better education. 
Before long, strangely enough, a man offered to sell, 
and did sell to Abraham and another as poor as himself, 
an old stock of goods, upon credit. They opened as 
merchants; and he says that was the store. Of course 
the}^ did nothing but get deeper and deeper in debt. He 
was appointed postmaster at New Salem — the office 
being too insignificant to make his politics an objection. 
The store winked out. The surveyor of Sangamon 
offered to depute to Abraham that portion of his work 
which was within his part of the county. He accepted, 
procured a compass and chain, studied Flint and Gibson 
a little, and went at it. This procured bread, and kept 
soul and body together. The election of 1834 came, 
and he was then elected to the legislature by the high- 
est vote cast for any candidate. Major John T. Stuart, 
then in full practice of the law, was also elected. Dur- 
ing the canvass, in a private conversation he encour- 
aged Abraham [to] study law. After the election he 
borrowed books of Stuart, took them home with him, 
and went? at it in good earnest. He studied with no- 
body. He still mixed in the surveying to pay board 
and clothing bills. When the legislature met, the law 
books were dropped, but were taken up again at the end 
of the session. He was reelected in 1836, 1838, and 
1840. In the autumn of 1836 he obtained a law 
license, and on April 15, 1837, removed to Springfield, 
and commenced the practice — his old friend Stuart tak- 
ing him into partnership. March 3, 1837, by a protest 
entered upon the "Illinois House Journal" of that 
date, at pages 817 and 818, Abraham, with Dan Stone, 
another representative of Sangamon, briefly defined his 
position on the slavery question; and so far as it goes, 
it was then the same that it is now. The protest is as 
follows : 



36 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

"Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery 
having passed both branches of the General Assembly 
at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest 
against the passage of the same. 

"They believe that the institution of slavery is 
founded on both injustice and bad policy, but that the 
promulgation of Abolition doctrines tends rather to 
increase than abate its evils. 

*'They believe that the Congress of the United States 
has no power under the Constitution to interfere with 
the institution of slavery in the different states. 

"They believe that the Congress of the United States 
has the power, under the Constitution, to abolish slavery 
in the District of Columbia, but that the power ought 
not to be exercised unless at the request of the people 
of the District. 

"The difference between these opinions and those 
contained in the above resolutions is their reason for 
entering this protest. 

"Dan Stone, 
"A. Lincoln, 

"Representatives from the County of Sangamon." 

In 1*838 and 1840, Mr. Lincoln's party voted for him 
as Speaker, but being in the minority he was not elected. 
After 1840 he declined a reelection to the legislature. 
He was on the Llarrison electoral ticket in 1840, and 
on that of Clay in 1844, and spent much time and labor 
in both those canvasses. In November, 1842, he was 
married to Mar}^, daughter of Robert S. Todd, of Lex- 
ington, Kentucky. They have three living children, all 
sons, one born in 1843, one in 1850, and one in 1853. 
They lost one, who was born in 1846. 

In 1846 he was elected to the lower House of Con- 
gress, and served one term only, commencing in Decem- 
ber, 1847, and ending with the inauguration of General 
Taylor, in March, 1849. All the battles of the Mexi- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOUN 37 

can war had been fought before Mr. Lincoln took his 
seat in Congress, but the American army was still in 
Mexico, and the treaty of peace was not fully and for- 
mally ratified until the June afterward. Much has been 
said of his course in Congress in regard to this war. 
A careful examination of the Journal and Congres- 
sional Globe shows that he voted for all the supply 
measures that came up, and for all the measures in 
any way favorable to the officers, soldiers, and their 
families, who conducted the war through; with the ex- 
ception that some of these measures passed without 
yeas and naj^'s, leaving no record as to how particular 
men voted. The Journal and Globe also show him 
voting that the war was unnecessarily and unconsti- 
tutionally begun by the President of the United States. 
This is the language of Mr. Ashmun's amendment, for 
which Mr. Lincoln and nearly or quite all other Whigs* 
of the House of Representatives voted. 

Mr. Lincoln's reasons for the opinion expressed by 
this vote were briefly that the President had sent Gen- 
eral Taylor into an inhabited part of the country be- 
longing to Mexico, and not to the United States, and 
thereby had provoked the first act of hostility, in fact 
the commencement of the war; that the place, being the 
country bordering on the east bank of the Rio Grande, 
was inhabited by native Mexicans, born there under the 
Mexican government, and had never submitted to, nor 
been conquered by, Texas or the United States, nor 
transferred to either by treaty ; that although Texas 
claimed the Rio Grande as her boundary, Mexico had 
never recognized it, and neither Texas nor the United 
States had ever enforced it; that there was a broad 

• The two major political parties in the United States at this 
time were the Whig-s and Democrats. The former, though dis- 
tinctly a party of opportunism, favored a protective tariff, 
internal improvements, a national bank, and in general the 
extension of the powers of the general government. The latter, 
dominated by its Southern wing, was the party of loose con- 
struction and states rights. Lincoln was a member of the Whig 
party, or, as he would have phrased it, "a Henry Clay Whig." 



38 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

desert between that and the country over which Texas 
had actual control; that the country where hostilities 
commenced, having once belonged to Mexico, must re- 
main so until it was somehow legally transferred, which 
had never been done. 

Mr. Lincoln thought the act of sending an armed 
force among the Mexicans was unnecessary, inasmuch 
as Mexico was in no way molesting or menacing the 
United States or the people thereof; and that it was 
unconstitutional, because the power of levying war 
is vested in Congress, and not in the President. He 
thought the principal motive for the act was to divert 
public attention from the surrender of "Fifty-four, 
forty, or fight" * to Great Britain, on the Oregon boun- 
dary question. 

Mr. Lincoln was not a candidate for reelection. 
This was determined upon and declared before he 
went to Washington, in accordance with an understand- 
ing among Whig friends, by which Colonel Hardin and 
Colonel Baker had each previously served a single term 
in this same district. 

In 1848, during his term in Congress, he advocated 
General Taylor's nomination for the presidency, in 
opposition to all others, and also took an active part for 
his election after his nomination, speaking a few times 
in Maryland, near Washington, several times in Mas- 
sachusetts, and canvassing quite fully his own district 
in Illinois, which was followed by a majority in the 
district of over 1500 for General Taylor. 

Upon his return from Congress he went to the prac- 
tice of the law wdth greater earnestness than ever be- 
fore. Ill 1852 he was upon the Scott electoral ticket, 

•The Democrats in the campaign of 1844 had as rallying 
cries- "The re-annexation of Texas and the re-occupation of 
Oregon" and "Fifty-four, forty, or fig-ht." Tlie latter referred 
to the dispute of the United States with Great Britain over the 
Oregon boundary ; Great Britain claiming forty-nine degrees, 
north latitude, as the line, while the United States claimed fifty- 
four degrees and forty minutes, north latitude. The British 
contention was finally accepted. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 39 

and did something in the way of canvassing, but owing 
to the hopelessness of the cause in Illinois, he did less 
than in previous presidential canvasses. 

In 1854* his profession had almost superseded the 
thought of politics in his mind, when the repeal of the 
Missouri Compromise* aroused him as he had never been 
before. 

In the autumn of that year he took the stump with no 
broader practical aim or object than to secure, if pos- 
sible, the reelection of Hon. Richard Yates to Congress. 
His speeches at once attracted a more marked attention 
than they had ever before done. As the canvass pro- 
ceeded he was drawn to different parts of the state out- 
side of Mr. Yates's district. He did not abandon the 
law, but gave his attention by turns to that and politics. 
The state agricultural fair w^as at Springfield that year, 
and Douglas f was announced to speak there. 

In the canvass of 1856 Mr. Lincoln made- over fifty 
speeches, no one of which, so far as he remembers, was 
put in print. One of them was made at Galena, but 
Mr. Lincoln has no recollection of it being printed ; nor 
does he remember whether in that speech he said any- 
thing about a Supreme Court decision. He may have 
spoken upon that subject, and some of the newspapers 
may have reported him as saying what is now ascribed 
to him; but he thinks he could not have expressed him- 
self as represented. 

The period of Lincoln's life which ended in 1854 was largely 

given to intense and successful efforts to lift himself from tlie 

humble circumstances in which he had been born, to the making 

of a living, and to the study and reflection, vitalized by human 

contacts, which made the finished man. The indications of 

intellectual and moral growth furnished by the selections which 

follow are interesting and significant in any study of his 

development. 

* See pag-e 73. 

t Stephen Arnold Douglas, United States senator from Illinois, 
and Lincoln's almost life-long rival. 



40 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Lincoln was an aspirant for political office at a compara- 
tively early age. This M^as, however, by no means unusual. 
Every young man in the West in that day thought of himself 
as a possible holder of office, not a remarkable thing in a 
society where every boy was taught that the Presidency was 
open to him, and at a time when Andrew Jackson had furnished 
conclusive evidence of the fact. Two years after he moved to 
Illinois, and only eight months after he became a resident of 
Sangamon County, he announced his candidacy for the legis- 
lature of the state on a conventional National Republican 
platform. The National Republicans in that year, it will be 
recalled, supported Henry Clay for President, and four years 
later furnished the bulk of the newly organized Whig party. 

The two papers, which are his first recorded political 
utterances, are characteristic of the later Lincoln in their 
simple directness. It may, however, be noted that never again 
did he call himself "humble Abraham Lincoln." Growing self- 
confidence destroyed that feeling. Nor is It possible to find 
many later allusions such as, "I was born and have ever 
remained in the most humble walks of life. I have no wealthy 
or popular relations or friends to recommend me." He was 
never remotely ashamed of the facts thus stated, but he would 
not make capital of them in appeals to the people. 



ANNOUNCEMENT OF CANDIDACY FOR THE 
LEG I SLA TUBE 

[Written about March 1, 1832] 

Fellow-Citizens: I presume you all know who I 
am. I am humble Abraham Lincoln. I have been so- 
licited by many friends to become a candidate for the 
Legislature. My politics are short and sweet, like the 
old woman's dance. I am in favor of a national bank. 
I am in favor of the internal improvement system, and 
a high protective tariff. These are my sentiments and 
political principles. If elected, I shall be thankful; if 
not, it will be all the same. 

A. Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 41 

ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE OF SANGAMON COUNTY 
[March 9, 1832] 

Fellow-Citizens: Having become a candidate for 
the honorable office of one of your representatives in the 
next General Assembly of this state, in accordance with 
an established custom and the principles of true Repub- 
licanism, it becomes my duty to make known to you — the 
people whom I propose to represent — my sentiments 
with regard to local affairs. 

Time and experience have verified to a demonstration, 
the public utility of internal improvements. That the 
poorest and most thinly populated countries would be 
greatly benefited by the opening of good roads, and in 
the clearing of navigable streams within their limits, is 
M'hat no person will deny. Yet it is folly to undertake 
works of this or any other kind, without first knowing 
that M^e are able to finish them — as half-finished work 
generally proves to be labor lost. There cannot justly 
be any objection to having railroads and canals, any more 
than to other good things, provided they cost nothing. 
The only objection is to paying for them; and the objec- 
tion arises from the want of ability to pay. 

With respect to the county of Sangamon, some more 
easy means of communication than it now possesses for 
the purpose of facilitating the task of exporting the 
surplus products of its fertile soil, and importing neces- 
sary articles from abroad, are indispensabW necessary. 
A meeting has been held of the citizens of Jacksonville, 
and the adj acent country, for the purpose of deliberating 
and inquiring into the expediency of constructing a rail- 
road from some eligible point on the Illinois river, 
through the town of Jacksonville, in Morgan County, to 
the town of Springfield in Sangamon County. This is, 
indeed, a very desirable object. No other improvement 
that reason will justify us in hoping for, can equal in 
utility the railroad. It is a never-failing source of com- 



42 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

munication, between places of business remotely situated 
from each other. Upon the railroad the regular progress 
of commercial intercourse is not interrupted by either 
high or low Mviter, or freezing weather, which are the 
principal difficulties that render our future hopes of 
water communication precarious and uncertain. 

Yet, however desirable an object the construction of a 
railroad through our country may be; however high our 
imaginations may be heated at thoughts of it — there is 
always a heart-appalling shock accompanying the amount 
of its cost, which forces us to shrink from our pleasing 
anticipations. The probable cost of this contemplated 
railroad is estimated at ^290,000 — the bare statement of 
which, in my opinion, is sufficient to justify the belief 
that the improvement of the Sangamon river is an object 
much better suited to our infant resources. 

Respecting this view, I think I may say, without the 
fear of being contradicted, that its navigation may be 
rendered completely practicable, as high as the mouth 
of the South Fork, or probably higher, to vessels of from 
25 to 30 tons burthen, for at least one-half of all common 
years, and to vessels of much greater burthen a part of 
that time. From my peculiar circumstances, it is prob- 
able that for the last twelve months I have given as 
particular attention to the stages of the water in this river 
as any other person in the country. In the month of 
March, 1831, in company with others, I commenced the 
building of a flatboat on the Sangamon, and finished and 
took her out in the course of the spring. Since that time 
I have been concerned in the mill at New Salem. These 
circumstances are sufficient evidence that I have not been 
very inattentive to the stages of the water. The time at 
which we crossed the milldam, being in the last days of 
April, the water was lower than it had been since the 
breaking of winter in February, or than it was for sev- 
eral weeks after. The principal difficulties we en- 
countered in descending the river were from the drifted 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 43 

timber, which obstructions all know are not difficult to 
be removed. Knowing almost precisely the height of 
water at that time, I believe I am safe in saying that 
it has as often been higher as lower since. 

From this view of the subject it appears that my 
calculations with regard to the navigation of the 
Sangamon cannot but be founded in reason; but what- 
ever may be its natural advantages, certain it is, that it 
never can be practically useful to any great extent with- 
out being greatly improved by art. The drifted timber, 
as I have before mentioned, is the most formidable 
barrier to this object. Of all parts of this river, none 
will require so much labor in proportion to make it 
navigable as the last thirty or thirty-five miles ; and going 
with the meanderings of the channel, when we are this 
distance above its mouth, we are only between twelve 
and eighteen miles above Beardstown in something near 
a straight direction, and this route is upon such low 
ground as to retain water in many places during the sea- 
son, and in all parts^ such as to draw two-thirds or three- 
fourths of the river water at all high stages. 

This route is on prairie land the whole distance — so 
that it appears to me, by removing the turf, a sufficient, 
width, and damming up the old channel, the whole river 
in a short time would wash its way through, thereby 
curtailing the distance, and increasing the velocity of 
the current very considerably, while there would be no 
timber upon the banks to obstruct its navigation in 
future ; and being nearly straight, the timber which might 
float in at the head would be apt to go clear through. 
There are also many places above this where the river, 
in its zigzag course, forms such complete peninsulas as 
to be easier cut at the necks than to remove the obstruc- 
tions from the bends — which, if done, would also lessen 
the distance. 

What the cost of this work would be, I am unable to 
say. It is probable, however, that it would not be greater 



44 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

than is common to streams of the same length. Finally, 
I believe the improvement of the Sangamon river to be 
vastly important and highly desirable to the people of 
the county ; and if elected, any measure in the legislature 
having this for its object, which may appear judicious, 
will meet my approbation and receive my support. 

It appears that the practice of loaning money at 
exorbitant rates of interest has already been opened as 
a field for discussion; so I suppose I may enter upon 
it without claiming the honor, or risking the danger, 
which may await its first explorer. It seems as though 
we are never to have an end to this baneful and corroding 
system, acting almost as prejudicially to the general 
interests of the community as a direct tax of several 
thousand dollars annually laid on each county, for the 
benefit of a few individuals only, unless there be a law 
made fixing a limit to the limits of usury. A law for 
this purpose, I am of opinion, may be made without 
materially injuring any class of people. In cases of 
extreme necessity there could always be means found to 
cheat the law, while in all other cases it would have its 
intended effect. I would favor the passage of a law 
upon this subject which might not be very easily evaded. 
Let it be such that the labor and difficulty of evading it 
could only be j ustified in cases of greatest necessity. 

Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dic- 
tate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say 
that I view it as the most important subject which we 
as a people can be engaged in. That every man may 
receive, at least, a moderate education, and thereb}'- be 
enabled to read the history of his own and other coun- 
tries, by which he may duly appreciate the value of our 
free institutions, appears to be an object of vital im- 
portance, even on this account alone, to say nothing of 
the advantages and satisfaction to be derived from all 
being able to read the scriptures and other works, both 
of a religious and moral nature, for tliemselves. For my 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 45 

part, I desire to see the time when education, and by its 
means, morality, sobriety, enterprise, and industry, shall 
become much more general than at present, and should 
be gratified to have it in my power to contribute some- 
thing to the advancement of any measure which might 
have a tendency to accelerate that happy period. 

With regard to existing law^s, some alterations are 
thought to be necessary. Many respectable men have 
suggested that our estray laws, the law respecting the 
issuing of executions, the road law, and some others, are 
deficient in their present form, and require alterations. 
But considering the great probability that the framers of 
those laws were w4ser than myself, I should prefer not 
meddling with them unless they were first attacked by 
others ; in which case I should feel it both a privilege 
and a duty to take that stand which, in my view, might 
tend most to the advancement of justice. 

But, fellow citizens, I shall conclude. Considering the 
great degree of modesty which should always attend 
youth, it is probable I have already been more presuming 
than becomes me. However, upon the subjects of which 
I have treated, I have spoken as I have thought. I may 
be wrong in regard to any or all of them ; but, holding it 
a sound maxim that it is better only sometimes to be 
right than at all times to be wrong, so soon as I discover 
my opinions to be erroneous I shall be ready to renounce 
them. 

Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. 
Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that I have 
no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my 
fellow men by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. 
How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition is 
yet to be developed. I am young and unknown to many 
of you. I was born and have ever remained in the most 
humble walks of life. I have no wealthy or popular 
relations or friends to recommend me. My case is thrown 
exclusively upon the independent voters of the county, 



46 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and if elected, they will have conferred a favor upon 
me for which I shall be unremitting in my labors to 
compensate. But if the good people in their wisdom 
shall see fit to keep me in the background, I have been 
too familiar with disappointments to be very much 
chagrined. 

Your friend and fellow-citizen, 

A. Lincoln 

Immediately after these announcements, the Black Hawk 
War broke out; Lincoln volunteered and, to his great surprise, 
was elected captain of his company, "a success," as he wrote 
years later, "that gave me more pleasure than any I have had 
since." He saw no fighting, but gained confidence in himself, 
learned how to handle men, and greatly widened the circle of 
his friends. When his company was mustered out, he reen- 
listed as a private, but in July he was back in New Salem, 
stumping the county. He displayed there the qualities of a 
shrewd stump speaker and debater which were later to assist 
powerfully in winning him fame. An interesting description 
of his appearance in this campaign is given by his friend, Judge 
S. T. Logan: "He was a very tall, gawky, and awkward- 
looking fellow then; his pantaloons didn't meet his shoes by 
six inches. But after he began speaking, I became very much 
interested in him." This description, in essence, remained true 
of him later. He always seemed awkward and ill-at-ease when 
he went on the platform, but when he began to speak, as a 
rule both he and his audience forgot all about it. 

Defeated for election, but with a most gratifying vote in 
his own precinct, Lincoln tried keeping a store. It was a 
disastrous experience, the store, as he said, "winking out" in 
less than a 3'ear, his partner being dissipated and he himself 
engaged in reading whatever books he could lay hands on. In 
this period he made the acquaintance of Shakespeare, Burns, 
and Gibbon, and a little later, that of Paine and Voltaire. He 
also found a copy of Blackstone's Commentaries in a barrel of 
rubbish. He literally devoured it, finding in it at last the 
determination of his later career. During this time he learned 
also the rudiments of surveying and secured welcome employ- 
ment in that way. He was postmaster of New Salem, carrying 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 47 

the mail in his hat and reading every newspaper whicli came 
before it could be called for. 

In 1834 he was elected to the legislature, where he took no 
active part but spent his time studying the methods of legisla- 
tion and the game of practical politics in which he was to 
become in time so supreme a master. Here for the first time 
he met his lifetime rival, Stephen Arnold Douglas, lately come 
from Vermont and preparing for the brilliant career so soon 
to be his. Lincoln's first comment on him is striking. He 
described him as "the least man I ever saw," alluding, of 
course, to his size. 

During this time he was continuing the reading of law, and 
even practicing before local magistrates. In 1836 he was again 
a successful candidate for the legislature. His announcement 
is notable for his advocacy of woman's suffrage. 



POLITICAL VIEWS IN 1836 

New Salem, June 13, 1836 

To THE Editor of the Journal: In your paper of 
last Saturday I see a communication, over the signature 
of "Many Voters," in which the candidates who are 
announced in the Journal are called upon to "show their 
hands." Agreed. Here's mine. 

I go for all sharing the privileges of the government 
who assist in bearing its burdens. Consequently, I go 
for admitting all whites to the right of suffrage who pay 
taxes or bear arms (by no means excluding females). 

If elected, I shall consider the whole people of 
Sangamon my constitutents, as well those that oppose as 
those that support me. 

While acting as their representative, I shall be gov- 
erned by their will on all subjects upon which I have 
the means of knowing what their will is; and upon all 
others I shall do what my own judgment teaches me will 
best advance their interests. Whether elected or not, I 
go for distributing the proceeds of the sales of the public 
lands to the several states, to enable our state, in common 



48 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

with others, to dig canals and construct railroads without 
borrowing money and paying the interest on it. 

If alive on the first Monday in November, I shall vote 
for Hugh L. White for President.* 
Very respectfully, 

A. Lincoln 

During this campaign he wrote a letter which is an excellent 
example of his honesty in a political campaign. It should not, 
however, be overlooked that this was also good politics. 

TO ROBERT ALLEN 

New Salem, June 21, 1836 

Dear Colonel: I am told that during my absence 

last week you passed through this place, and stated 

publicly that you were in possession of a fact or facts 

which, if known to the public, would entirely destroy 

the prospects of N. W. Edwards and myself at the 

ensuing election; but that, through favor to us, you 

should forbear to divulge them. No one has needed 

favors more than I, and, generally, few have been less 

unwilling to accept them; but in this case favor to me 

would be injustice to the public, and therefore I must 

beg your pardon for declining it. That I once had the 

confidence of the people of Sangamon, is sufficiently 

evident; and if I have since done anything, either by 

design or misadventure, which if known would subject 

me to a forfeiture of that confidence, he that knows of 

that thing, and conceals it, is a traitor to his country's 

interest. 

I find myself wholly unable to form any conjecture of 

what fact or facts, real or supposed, you spoke; but my 

opinion of your veracity will not permit me for a moment 

to doubt that you at least believed what you said. I am 

flattered with the personal regard you manifested for me ; 

♦ Hugh L. "White, Senator from Tennessee, was one of the four 
candidates for whom the Whigs voted in 1836. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 49 

but I do hope that, on more mature reflection, you will 
view the public interest as a paramount consideration, 
and therefore determine to let the worst come. I here 
assure you that the candid statement of facts on your 
part, however low it may sink me, shall never break the 
tie of personal friendship between us. I wish an answer 
to this, and you are at liberty to publish both, if you 
choose. Very respectfully, 

A. Lincoln 

Lincoln was finding himself in this campaign. It was here 
that he showed himself able to retaliate against an opponent. 
One Forquer, who resided in Springfield, though not a candi- 
date, entered the canvass against Lincoln to "take him down." 
He devoted himself to scornful derision of Lincoln's dress, 
manners, and general personal appearance. Forquer had him- 
self been a Whig, but having become a Democrat he had been 
rewarded by a lucrative office. He lived in what was probably 
the finest house in Springfield, which was equipped with a 
lightning rod, then a new thing in Illinois. At the conclusion 
of his speech, Lincoln replied and thus closed: "The gentle- 
man has seen fit to allude to my being a young man, but he 
forgets that I am older in years than I am in the tricks and 
trades of a politician. I desire to live, and I desire place and 
distinction, but I would rather die now than, like the gentle- 
man, live to see the day that I would change my politics for 
an office worth three thousand dollars a year, and then feel 
compelled to erect a lightning rod over my house to protect a 
guilty conscience from an offended God." 

In the legislature Lincoln was one of the "Long Nine,"* who 
secured the removal of the capital from Vandalia to Spring- 
field and carried through a law for a system of canals and 
railways costing twelve million dollars. He was carried away 
with the internal improvements idea and was planning to be 
the "DeWitt Clinton of Illinois."! 

This session furnished Lincoln the opportunity to express 
for the first time his feeling on the subject of slavery. The 

* All nine of these membei's were very tall. 

t DeWitt Clinton, of New York, was the person most respon- 
sible for the Erie Canal, as well as other internal improvements. 



50 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

abolition movement was now well under way, and Illinois was 
full of pro-slavery sentiment. The legislature passed the fol- 
lowing resolutions: 

"Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of Illinois: 

"That we highly disapprove of the formation of Abolition 
Societies, and of the doctrines promulgated by them. 

"That the right of property in slaves is sacred to the slave- 
holding states by the Federal Constitution, and that they can- 
not be deprived of that right without their consent. 

"That the General Government cannot abolish slavery in the 
District of Columbia against the consent of the citizens of said 
District, without a manifest breach of good faith. 

"That the Governor be requested to transmit to the States of 
Virginia, Alabama, Mississippi, New York, and Connecticut a 
copy of the foregoing report and resolutions." 

Lincoln had seen slavery from his boyhood in Kentucky. 
He had seen a harsher type on a trip down the Mississippi to 
New Orleans. His dislike for the institution was characteristic 
of the class from which he was sprung, and in him it had 
become intensified. These resolutions excited his opposition 
chiefly because they contained no condemnation of slaverj^ and 
possibly because of the phrase, "the right of property in slaves 
is sacred." He voted against them and persuaded another 
Sangamon County representative to sign with him this protest. 



PROTEST AGAINST SLAVERY 
[March 3, 1837] 

The following protest was presented to the House 
March 3, 1837, which was read and ordered to be spread 
on the journals, to wit: 

Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery hav- 
ing passed both branches of the General Assembly at its 
present session, the undersigned hereby protest against 
the passage of the same. 

They believe that the institution of slavery is founded 
on both injustice and bad policy, but that the promul- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 51 

gation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than 
abate its evils. 

They believe that the Congress of the United States 
has no power under the Constitution to interfere with 
the institution of slavery in the different states. 

They believe that the Congress of the United States 
has the power, under the Constitution, to abolish slavery 
in the District of Columbia, but that the power ought not 
to be exercised, unless at the request of the people of 
the District. 

The difference between these opinions and those con- 
tained in the said resolutions is their reason for entering 
this protest. 

Dan Stone, 
A. Lincoln, 
Representatives from the County of Sangamon. 

In March, 1836, Lincoln had been admitted to the bar, and 
in 1837 he moved to Springfield. Before this time he had 
become engaged to Anne Rutledge, whom he tenderly loved 
but who died within a short time. Her death had a most 
powerful influence upon him, and his friends almost despaired 
of his reason. It apparently destroyed in him any capacity 
for a later romance. The following letter is descriptive of his 
second love aifair. It lacks the taste characteristic of most 
of his writings, but the life of an almost frontier community 
lacked many of the refinements, and the wonder is that Lincoln 
had as much instinctive good taste as he did. The letter shows 
one side of Lincoln at this period, and for that reason it is 
included. 

TO MRS. O. H. BROWNING 

Springfield, April 1, 1838 
Dear Madam : Without apologizing for being egotis- 
tical, I shall make the history of so much of my life as 
has elapsed since I saw you the subject of this letter. 
And, by the way, I now discover that in order to give a 
full and intelligible account of the things I have done 



52 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and suffered since I saw you, I shall necessarily have to 
relate some that happened before. 

It was, then, in the autumn of 1836 that a married 
lady of my acquaintance, and who was a great friend of 
mine, being about to pay a visit to her father and other 
relatives residing in Kentucky, proposed to me that on 
her return she would bring a sister of hers with her on 
condition that I would engage to become her brother-in- 
law with all convenient dispatch. I, of course, accepted 
the proposal, for you know I could not have done other- 
wise had I really been averse to it; but privately, be- 
tween you and me, I was most confoundedly well pleased 
with the project. I had seen the said sister some three 
years before, thought her intelligent and agreeable, and 
saw no good objection to plodding life through, hand-in- 
hand with her. Time passed on, the lady took her 
journey, and in due time returned, sister in company, 
sure enough. This astonished me a little, for it appeared 
to me that her coming so readily showed that she was a 
trifle too willing, bift on reflection it occurred to me that 
she might have been prevailed on by her married sister 
to come, without anything concerning me having been 
mentioned to her, and so I concluded that if no other 
objection presented itself, I would consent to waive this. 
All this occurred to me on hearing of her arrival in the 
neighborhood — for, be it ifemembered, I had not yet seen 
her, except about three years previous, as above men- 
tioned. In a few days we had an interview, and, al- 
though I had seen her before, she did not look as my 
imagination had pictured her. I knew she was over-size, 
but she now appeared a fair match for Falstaff. I knew 
she was called an "old maid," and I felt no doubt of the 
truth of at least half of the appellation, but now, when 
I beheld her, I could not for my life avoid thinking of 
my mother; and this, not from withered features — for 
her skin was too full of fat to permit of its contracting 
into wrinkles — but from her want of teeth, weather- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 53 

beaten appearance in general^ and from a kind of notion 
that ran in my head that nothing could have commenced 
at the size of infancy and reached her present bulk in 
less than thirty-five or forty years ; and, in short, I was 
not at all pleased with her. But what could I do? I 
had told her sister that I would take her for better or 
for worse, and I made a point of honor and conscience 
in all things to stick to my word, especially if others 
had been induced to act on it, which in this case I had 
no doubt they had, for I was now fairly convinced that 
no other man on earth would have her, and hence the 
conclusion that they were bent on holding me to my 
bargain. "Well," thought I, "I have said it, and, be the 
consequences what they may, it shall not be my fault if 
I fail to do it." At once I determined to consider her 
my wife, and this done, all my powers of discovery were 
put to work in search of perfections in her which might 
be fairly set off against her defects. I tried to imagine 
her handsome, which, but for her unfortunate corpulency, 
was actually true. Exclusive of this, no woman that I 
have ever seen has a finer face. I also tried to convince 
myself that the mind was much more to be valued than 
the person, and in this she was not inferior, as I could 
discover, to any with whom I had been acquainted. 

Shortly after this, without attempting to come to any 
positive understanding with her, I set out for Vandalia, 
when and where you first saw me. During my stay there 
I had letters from her which did not change my opinion 
of either her intellect or intention, but, on the contrary, 
confirmed it in both. 

All this while, although I was fixed "firm as the surge- 
repelling rock" in my resolution, I found I was con- 
tinually repenting the rashness which had led me to 
make it. Through life I have been in no bondage, either 
real or imaginary, from the thralldom of which I so much 
desired to be free. After my return home I saw nothing 
to change my opinion of her in any particular. She was 



54 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

the same, and so was I. I now spent my time in plan- 
ning how I might get along in life after my contemplated 
change of circumstances should have taken place, and 
how I might procrastinate the evil day for a time, which 
I really dreaded as much, perhaps more, than an Irish- 
man does the halter. 

After all my sufferings upon this deeply interesting 
subject, here I am, wholly, unexjDectedly, completely out 
of the "scrape," and I now want to know if you can 
guess how I got out of it — out, clear, in every sense of 
the term — no violation of word, honor, or conscience. I 
don't believe you can guess, and so I might as well tell 
you at once. As the lawyer says, it was done in the 
manner following, to wit: After I had delayed the 
matter as long as I thought I could in honor do (which, 
by the way, had brought me round into the last fall), I 
concluded I might as well bring it to a consummation 
without further delay, and so I mustered my resolution 
and made the proposal to her direct; but, shocking to 
relate, she answered No. At first I supposed she did 
it through an affectation of modesty, which I thought 
but ill became her under the peculiar circumstances of 
the case, but on my renewal of the charge I found she 
repelled it with greater firmness than before. I tried 
it again and again, but with the same success, or rather 
with the same want of success. 

I finally was forced to give it up, at which I very 
unexpectedly found myself mortified almost beyond en- 
durance. I was mortified, it seemed to me, in a hundred 
different ways. My vanity was deeply wounded by the 
reflection that I had so long been too stupid to discover 
her intentions, and at the same time never doubting that 
I understood them perfectly ; and also that she, whom I 
had taught myself to believe nobod}^ else would have, 
had actually rejected me with all my fancied greatness. 
And, to cap the whole, I then for the first time began 
to suspect that I was really a little in love with her. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 55 

But let it all go! I'll try and outlive it. Others have 
been made fools of by the girls, but this can never in 
truth be said of me. I most emphatically, in this in- 
stance, made a fool of myself. I have now come to the 
conclusion never again to think of marrying, and for 
this reason — I can never be satisfied with anyone who 
would be blockhead enough to have me. 

When you receive this, write me a long yarn about 
something to amuse me. Give my respects to Mr. 
Browning. 

Your sincere friend, 

A. Lincoln 

In Springfield Lincoln entered upon the practice of law, 
and in 1838 and 1840 was again elected to the legislature, being 
the minority candidate for speaker at both sessions. He was 
actively in politics and exceedingly ambitious, and in 1840 was 
a Whig candidate for elector. 

No man in the West at this time could engage in the rough 
and tumble game of politics without personal difficulties. 
Lincoln had his, but his rather singular patience, good humor, 
and gentleness all tended to soften down the difficulties and 
prevent serious quarrels. But he would not yield when he 
was sure that he was right. The following letter evidently 
related to one of these difficulties: 

TO W. O. ANDERSON* 

Lawrenceville, 111., October 31, 1840 

Dear Sir: Your note of yesterday is received. In 

the difficulty between us of which you speak, you say you 

think I was the aggressor. I do not think I was. You 

say my "words imported insult." I meant them as a 

fair set-off to your own statements, and not otherwise; 

and in that light alone I now wish you to understand 

them. You ask for my present "feelings on the subject." 

I entertain no unkind feelings to you, and none of any 

* W. G. Anderson represented Lawrence County in the Illinois 
legislature at the sessions of 1832, 1842, and 1844. - 



56 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

sort upon the subject, except a sincere regret that I 
permitted myself to get into such an altercation. 

Yours, etc., 

A. Lincoln 

The following letter, written to the sister of an intimate 
friend, is characteristic of Lincoln at this period of his life. 
It is also interesting for its allusion to the most horrible 
feature of slavery. 

TO 311 SS MARY SPEED 

Bloomington, 111., September 27, 1841 
Miss Mary Speed, Louisville, Ky. 

My Friend: Having resolved to write to some of 
your mother's family, and not having the express per- 
mission of any one of them to do so, I have had some 
little difficulty in determining on which to inflict the task 
of reading what I now feel must be a most dull and silly 
letter; but when I remembered that you and I were 
something of cronies while I was at Farmington, and 
that while there I was under the necessity of shutting 
you up in a room to prevent your committing an assault 
and battery upon me, I instantly decided that you should 
be the devoted one. I assume that you have not heard 
from Joshua and myself since we left, because I think it 
doubtful whether he has written. 

You remember there was some uneasiness about 
Joshua's health when we left. That little indisposition 
of his turned out to be nothing serious, and it was pretty 
nearly forgotten when we reached Springfield. 

We got on board the steamboat Lebanon in the locks 
of the canal, about twelve o'clock m. of the day we left, 
and reached St. Louis the next Monday at 8 p. m. Noth- 
ing of interest happened during the passage, except the 
vexatious delays occasioned by the sandbars we thought 
interesting. 

By the way, a fine example was presented on board 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 57 

the boat for contemplating the effect of condition upon 
human happiness. A gentleman had purchased twelve 
negroes in different parts of Kentucky, and was taking 
them to a farm in the South. They were chained six 
and six together. A small iron clevis was around the 
left wrist of each, and this w^as fastened to the main 
chain by a shorter one, at a convenient distance from 
the others, so that the negroes were strung together pre- 
cisely like so many fish upon a trot-line. In this condition 
they were being separated forever from the scenes of 
their childhood, their friends, their fathers and mothers, 
and brothers and sisters, and many of them from their 
wives and children, and going into perpetual slavery, 
where the lash of the master is proverbially more ruth- 
less and unrelenting than any other where ; and yet amid 
all these distressing circumstances, as we would think 
them, they were the most cheerful and apparently happy 
creatures on board. One, whose offense for which he 
had been sold was an over-fondness for his wife, played 
the fiddle almost continually, and the others danced, 
sang, cracked jokes, and played various games with cards 
from day to day. How true it is that "God tempers the 
wind to the shorn lamb," * or in other words, that He 
renders the worst of human conditions tolerable, while 
He permits the best to be nothing better than tolerable. 
To return to the narrative. When we reached Spring- 
field, I stayed but one day, when I started on this tedious 
circuit where I now am. 

Do you remember ni}^ going to the city, while I was 
in Kentucky, to have a tooth extracted, and making a 
failure of it? Well, that same old tooth got to paining 
me so much that about a week since I had it torn out, 
bringing with it a bit of the jawbone, the consequence 
of which is that my mouth is now so sore that I can 
neither talk nor eat. 

* Sterne, Sentimental Journey. 



58 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I am literally "subsisting on savory remembrances" — 
that is, being unable to eat, I am living upon the remem- 
brance of the delicious dishes of peaches and cream we 
used to have at your house. When we left, Miss Fanny 
Henning was owing you a visit, as I understood. Has 
she paid it yet.'' If she has, are you not convinced that 
she is one of the sweetest girls in the world? There is 
but one thing about her, so far as I could perceive, that 
I would have otherwise than as it is — that is, something 
of a tendency to melancholy. This, let it be observed, 
is a misfortune, not a fault. 

Give her an assurance of my very highest regard when 
you see her. Is little Siss Eliza Davis at your house 
yet.^ If she is, kiss her "o'er and o'er again" for me. 

Tell your mother that I have not got her "present" 
[an "Oxford" Bible] with me, but I intend to read it 
regularly when I return home. I doubt not that it is 
really, as she says, the best cure for tJie blues, could one 
but take it according to the truth. Give my respects to 
all your sisters (including Aunt Emma) and brothers. 
Tell Mrs. Peay, of whose happy face I shall long retain 
a pleasant remembrance, that I have been trying to 
think of a name for her homestead, but as yet cannot 
satisfy myself with one. I shall be very happy to re- 
ceive a line from you soon after you receive this, and in 
case you choose to favor me with one, address it to 
Charleston, Coles County, 111., as I shall be there about 
the time to receive it. 

Your sincere friend, 

A. Lincoln 

The next few years saw Lincoln, after an unlucky engage- 
ment, married to Mary Todd; in partnership in law, first with 
Judge Logan and later with William H. Herndon; and con- 
tinuing his active work in politics. In 1844 he was a Whig 
candidate for elector and as such made speeches in various 
parts of Illinois and also in Indiana. In 1843 he M'as a candi- 
date for Congress but was defeated by John J. Hardin. It is 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 59 

probable that it was then agreed that Edward D. Baker should 
be elected two years later, to be followed in 1846 by Lincoln. 
In the meantime anti-slavery sentiment, long-delayed, was 
growing in Illinois, and in 1844 the Liberty party, which 
nominated James G. Birney for President, gained considerable 
strength in the state, though not enough to influence the result. 
Two brothers, Williamson and Madison Durley, were promi- 
nent leaders in the party, and in 1845 Lincoln, keenly interested 
in the course of state politics, and himself a prospective candi- 
date for Congress, wrote to Williamson Durley this letter, 
notable for its practical logic. 

TO WILLIAMSON DURLEY 

Springfield, October 3, 1845 
Dear Sir: When I saw you at home, it was agreed 
that I should write to you and your brother, Madison. 
Until I then saw you I was not aware of your being 
what is generally called an abolitionist, or, as you call 
yourself, a Liberty man, though I well knew there were 
many such in your country. 

I was glad to hear that you intended to attempt to bring 
about, at the next election in Putnam, a union of the 
Whigs proper and such of the Liberty men as are Whigs 
in principle on all questions save only that of slavery. 
So far as I can perceive, by such union neither party 
need yield anything on the point in difference between 
them. If the Whig abolitionists of New York had voted 
with us last fall, Mr. Clay would now be President, Whig 
principles in the ascendant, and Texas not annexed; 
whereas, by the division, all that either had at stake in 
the contest was lost. And, indeed, it was extremely 
probable beforehand that such would be the result. As 
I have always understood, the Liberty men deprecated 
the annexation of Texas extremely; and this being so, 
why they should refuse to cast their votes [so] as to 
prevent it, even to me seemed wonderful. What was 
their process of reasoning, I can only judge from what 
a single one of them told me. It was this: "We are 



60 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

not to do evil that good may come." This general 
proposition is doubtless correct; but did it apply? If by 
your votes you could have prevented the extension, etc., 
of slavery, would it not have been good, and not evil, so 
to have used your votes, even though it involved the cast- 
ing of them for a slaveholder.^ By the fruit the tree is 
to be known. An evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit. 
If the fruit of electing Mr. Clay would have been to 
prevent the extension of slavery, could the act of elect- 
ing have been evil? 

But I will not argue further. I perhaps ought to say 
that individually I never was much interested in the 
Texas question. I never could see much good to come 
of annexation, inasmuch as they were already a free 
republican people on our own model. On the other hand, 
I never could very clearly see how tlie annexation w^ould 
augment the evil of slavery. It always seemed to me 
that slaves would be taken there in about equal numbers, 
with or without annexation. And if more were taken 
because of annexation, still there would be just so many 
the fewer left where they were taken from. It is pos- 
sibly true^ to some extent, that with annexation, some 
slaves may be sent to Texas and continued in slavery 
that otherwise might have been liberated. To whatever 
extent this may be true, I think annexation an evil. I 
hold it to be a paramount duty of us in the free states, 
due to the union of the states, and perhaps to liberty 
itself (paradox though it may seem), to let the slavery 
of the other states alone; while, on the other hand, I 
hold it to be equally clear that we should never know- 
ingly lend ourselves, directly or indirectly, to prevent 
that slavery from dying a natural death — to find new 
places for it to live in, when it can no longer exist in 
the old. Of course I am not now considering what would 
be our duty in cases of insurrection among the slaves. 
To recur to the Texas question, I understand the Liberty 
men to have viewed annexation as a much greater evil 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 61 

than ever I did, and I would like to convince you, if I 
could, that they could have prevented it, if they had 
chosen. 

I intend this letter for you and Madison together, and 
if you and he, or either, shall think fit to drop me a line, 
I shall be pleased. 

Yours with respect, 

A. Lincoln 



In 1846 Lincoln was at last elected to Congress. The 
Mexican War had already been fought, but he was violently 
opposed to the policy of the administration, and his speeches 
were largely devoted to attacks upon President Polk as the 
responsible aggressor against Mexico. He sought in every way 
to prove the administration guilty of falsehood in relation to 
the war, and thereby greatly antagonized his district. During 
his term he favored and voted for the Wilmot Proviso, which 
was intended to exclude slavery from the new territory acquired 
from Mexico. He voted against a resolution for the abolition 
of slavery in the District of Columbia, because it did not 
require the assent of Virginia and Maryland, which he thought 
necessary from a moral standpoint, and because there was no 
provision for compensation. He also voted against a resolution 
looking to the abolition of the slave-trade in the District 
because he did not like the form of the resolution. Later, he 
oflFered an elaborate substitute. 

In this short experience he showed no greater capacities than 
the average run of new members. He was a clever Western 
politician, so far as one could see, and that was all. A close 
study of his activities, however, does reveal the fact that he 
did not mind unpopularity, if he was convinced that he was 
right and that he had a fairly consistent record of supporting 
his convictions. 

It was sound experience for him, in that it brought him in 
contact with the workings of government at Washington and 
with the men who conducted it. He made a number of warm 
friends, among them Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia, later 
Nice President of the Confederacy. Lincoln's first allusion to 
him in his letters is most interesting. 



62 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO WILLIAM H. HE END ON 

Washington, February 2, 18-18 
Dear William: I just take my pen Jto say that Mr. 
Stephens, of Georgia, a little, slim, pale-faced, con- 
sumptive man, with a voice like Logan's, has just con- 
cluded the very best speech of an hour's length I ever 
heard. My old withered dry eyes are full of tears yet. 
If he writes it out anything like he delivered it, our 
people shall see a good many copies of it. 
Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Lincoln had no desire to leave Congress. Not only was he 
ambitious and firm in the belief that there lay his road to 
distinction, but he also liked the life and work of a member of 
Congress. He had secured recognition from his party and 
acquired a degree of leadership that was very gratifying to him. 
But he could not ask for reelection without a breach of faith 
with his district, in which he had preached rotation in ofl&ce 
and thereby secured election. In January, 1848, he wrote, "I 
made the declaration that I would not be a candidate again 
more from a wish to deal fairly with others, to keep peace 
among our friends, and to keep the district from going to the 
enemy, than from any cause personal to myself; so that if it 
should happen that nobody else wishes to be elected, I could 
not refuse the people the right of sending me again. But to 
enter myself as a competitor of others, or to authorize anyone 
so to enter me, is what my word and honor forbid." 

Accordingly he retired at the expiration of his term, without 
the prospect of any office in which he might continue in active 
political life. He was a tardy applicant for the post of com- 
missioner of the land office, refraining in order not to injure 
the chances of a friend, but he failed to secure the appoint- 
ment. There was, however, a strong disposition among the 
Whigs to reward him for his activity, and in the summer of 
1849 he was oifered by President Taylor the governorship of 
Oregon Territory. Many of his friends urged him to accept 
and he was tempted to do so, since Oregon had the lure of the 
unknown and because it was clear that it would soon be ad- 
mitted to statehood, when he would have little difficultv in 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 63 

securing an election to the L'^nited States Senate, He had 
never aspired higher than the Senate, and he was frankly 
tempted by the prospect. But his wife, fortunately for his 
future, was opposed and he declined. 

He was keenly interested in the success of the Taylor admin- 
istration. The following letter, inspired by that feeling, is 
interesting for its reflection of his admiration for Jackson's 
decisiveness and readiness to assume responsibility: 

TO JOHN M. CLAYTON 

Springfield, 111., July 28, 1849 
Hon. J. M. Clayton, Sec'y of State. 

Dear Sir: It is with some hesitation I presume to 
address you this letter — and yet I wish not only you, but 
the whole cabinet, and the President, too, would consider 
the subject matter of it — my being among the people, 
while you and they are not, will excuse the apparent 
presumption. It is understood that the President at first 
adopted, as a general rule, to throw the responsibility 
of the appointments upon the respective Departments; 
and that such rule is adhered to and practiced upon. 
This course I at first thought proper; and, of course, I 
am not now com^Dlaining of it. Still I am disappointed 
with the effect of it upon the public mind. It is fixing 
for the President the unjust and ruinous character of 
being a mere man of straw. This must be arrested, or it 
will damn us all inevitably. It is said Gen. Taylor and 
his officers held a council of war at Palo Alto (I believe) ; 
and that he then fought the battle against unanimous 
opinion of those officers — this fact (no matter whether 
rightfully or wrongfully) gives him. more popularity 
than ten thousand submissions, however really wise and 
magnanimous those submissions may be. The appoint- 
ments need be no better than they have been, but the 
public must be brought to understand that they are the 
President's appointments. He must occasionally say, or 
seem to say, "by the Eternal," "I take the responsi- 



64 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

bility." Those phrases were the "Samson's locks" of 
Gen. Jackson, and we dare not disregard the lessons of 
experience. Your Ob't Sev't, 

A. Lincoln 

With no political future apparently before him, and with 
urgent need of a growing income, Lincoln now quietly took 
leave of politics and devoted himself almost exclusively to the 
practice of law. In this connection some notes of his for a 
law lecture, written about this time, throw light on the pro- 
fessional ideas and ideals of the man. 

NOTES FOR A LAW LECTURE 
[Written about July 1, 1851] 

I am not an accomplished lawyer. I find quite as 
much material for a lecture in those points wherein I 
have failed as in those wherein I have been moderately 
successful. The leading rule for the lawyer, as for the 
man of every other calling, is diligence. Leave nothing 
for tomorrow which can be done today. Never let j^our 
correspondence fall behind. Whatever piece of business 
you have in hand, before stopping, do all the labor per- 
taining to it which can then be done. When you bring 
a common law-suit, if you have the facts for doing so, 
write the declaration at once. If a law point be involved, 
examine the books, and note the authority you rely on 
upon the declaration itself, wdiere you are sure to find it 
when wanted. The same of defenses and pleas. In 
business not likely to be litigated — ordinary collection 
cases, foreclosures, partitions, and the like — make all 
examinations of titles, and note them and even draft 
orders and decrees in advance. This course has a triple 
advantage; it avoids omissions and neglect, saves your 
labor when once done, performs the labor out of court 
when you have leisure, rather than in court when you 
have not. 

Extemporaneous speaking should be practiced and 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 65 

cultivated. It is the lawyer's avenue to the public. How- 
ever able and faithful he may be in other respects, 
people are slow to bring him business if he cannot make 
a speech. And yet there is not a more fatal error to 
young lawj^ers than relying too much on speech-making. 
If anyone, upon his rare powers of speaking, shall claim 
a.n exemption from the drudgery of the law, his case is 
a failure in advance. 

Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to 
compromise whenever you can. Point out to them how 
the nominal winner is often a real loser — in fees, ex- 
penses, and waste of time. As a peacemaker the lawyer 
has a superior opportunity of being a good man. There 
will still be business enough. 

Never stir up litigation. A worse man can scarcely 
be found than one who does this. Who can be more 
nearly a fiend than he who habitually overhauls the 
register of deeds in search of defects in titles, whereon 
to stir up strife, and put money in his pocket? A moral 
tone ought to be infused into the profession which should 
drive such men out of it. 

The matter of fees is important, far beyond the mere 
question of bread and butter involved. Properly at- 
tended to, fuller justice is done to both lawyer and client. 
An exorbitant fee should never be claimed. As a general 
rule never take your whole fee in advance, nor any more 
than a small retainer. When fully paid beforehand, you 
are more than a common mortal if yon can feel the same 
interest in the case, as if something was still in prospect 
for you, as well as for your client. And when you lack 
interest in the case, the job will very likely lack skill and 
diligence in the performance. Settle the amount of fee 
and take a note in advance. Then you will feel that you 
are working for something, and you are sure to do your 
work faithfully and well." Never sell a fee note — at least 
not before the consideration service is performed. It leads 
t.> negligence and dishonesty — negligence by losing in- 



66 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

terest in the case, and dishonesty in refusing to refund 
when you have allowed the consideration to fail. 

There is a vague popular belief that lawyers are neces- 
sarily dishonest. I say vague, because when we consider 
to what extent confidence and honors are reposed in and 
conferred upon lawyers by the people, it appears im- 
probable that their impression of dishonesty is very dis- 
tinct and vivid. Yet the impression is common, almost' 
universal. Let no young man choosing the law for a 
calling for a moment yield to the popular belief — resolve 
to be honest at all events; and if in your own judgment 
you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest 
without being a lawyer. Choose some other occupation, 
rather than one in the choosing of which you do, in 
advance, consent to be a knave. 

His financial needs were greatly increased bv his growing 
family and by the necessity of assisting his father and step- 
mother, who now, after years of moving from place to place, 
Avere settled at Goose Nest Prairie, Illinois. Thomas Lincoln 
died in 1851, and Lincoln's care for his step-mother continued 
until his death. One of her sons by her first marriage was 
John D, Johnston. He was an amiable but shiftless n'er-do-well 
who constantly appealed to Lincoln for aid. Three letters to 
him, written in 1851, show the sound common sense of Lincoln 
as well as his kindlv nature. 



TO JOHN D. JOHNSTON 

January 2, 1851 
Dear Johnston : Your request for eighty dollars I do 
not think best to comply w^ith now. At the various times 
when I have helped you a little you have said to me, 
"We can get along very well now"; but in a very short 
time I find you in the same difficulty again. Now this 
can only happen by some defect in your conduct. What 
that defect is, I think I know. You are not lazy, and 
still you are an idler. I .doubt whether, since I saw you, 
you have done a good whole day's work in any one day. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 67 

You do not very much dislike to work^ and still you do 
not work much, merely because it does not seem to you 
that you could get much for it. This habit of uselessly 
wasting time is the whole difficulty ; it is vastly important 
to you, and still more so to your children, that you should 
break the habit. It is more important to them, because 
they have longer to live, and can keep out of an idle 
habit before they are in it, easier than they can get out 
after they are in. 

You are now in need of some money; and what I pro- 
pose is, that you shall go to work, "tooth and nail," for 
somebody who will give you money for it. Let father 
and your boys take charge of your things at home, pre- 
pare for a crop, and make the crop, and you go to work 
for the best money wages, or in discharge of any debt 
you owe, that you can get; and to secure you a fair 
reward for your labor, I now promise you, that for every 
dollar that you will, between this and the first of May, 
get for your own labor, either in money or as your own 
indebtedness, I will then give you one other dollar. By 
this, if you hire yourself at ten dollars a month, from 
me you will get ten more, making twenty dollars a 
month for jour work. In this I do not mean you shall 
go off to St. Louis, or the lead mines, or the gold mines 
in California, but I mean for you to go at it for the best 
wages you can get close to home in Coles County. Now, 
if you will do this, you will soon be out of debt, and, 
what is better, you will have a habit that will keep you 
from getting in debt again. But if I should now clear 
you out of debt, next year you would be just as deep in 
as ever. You say you would almost give your place in 
heaven for seventy or eighty dollars. Then you value 
your place in heaven very cheap, for I am sure you can, 
with the offer I make, get the seventy or eighty dollars for 
four or five months' work. You say if I will furnish you 
the money you will deed me the land, and, if you don't pay 
the money back, you will deliver possession. Nonsense ! 



€8 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

If you can't now live with the land, how will you then 
live without it? You have always been kind to me, and 
I do not mean to be unkind to you. On the contrary, if 
you will but follow my advice, you will find it worth 
more than eighty times eighty dollars to you. 
Affectionately your brother, 

A. Lincoln 

TO JOHN D. JOHNSTON 

Shelbyville, November 4, 1851 
Dear Brother: When I came into Charleston day 
before yesterday, I learned that you are anxious to sell 
the land where you live and move to Missouri. I have 
been thinking of this ever since, and cannot but think 
such a notion utterly foolish. What can you do in 
Missouri better than here.^ Is the land any richer? Can 
you there, any more than here, raise corn and wheat and 
oats without work? Will anybody there, any more than 
here, do your work for you? If you intend to go to work, 
there is no better place than right where you are; if 
you do not intend to go to work, you cannot get along 
anywhere. Squirming and crawling about from place to 
place can do no good. You have raised no crop this 
year; and what you really want is to sell the land, get 
the money, and spend it. Part with the land you have, 
and, my life upon it, you will never after own a spot big 
enough to bury you in. Half you will get for the land 
you will spend in moving to Missouri, and the other half 
you will eat, drink, and wear out, and no foot of land 
will be bought. Now, I feel it my duty to have no hand 
in such a piece of foolery. I feel that it is so even on 
your own account, and particularly on mother's account. 
The eastern forty acres I intend to keep for mother 
while she lives; if you will not cultivate it, it will rent 
for enough to support her — at least, it will rent for 
something. Her dower in the other two forties she can 
let you have, and no thanks to me. Now, do not mis- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 69 

understand this letter; I do not write it in any unkind- 
ness. I write it in order^ if possible, to get you to face 
the truth, which truth is, you are destitute because you 
have idled away all your time. Your thousand pretenses 
for not getting along better are all nonsense; they 
deceive nobody but yourself. Go to work is the only 
cure for your case. 

A word to mother. Chapman tells me he wants you 
to go and live with him. If I were you I would try it 
awhile. If you get tired of it (as I think you will not), 
you can return to your own home. Chapman feels very 
kindly to you, and I have no doubt he will make your 
situation very pleasant. 

Sincerely your son, 

A. Lincoln 

TO JOHN D. JOHNSTON 

Springfield, November 25, 1851 
John D. Johnston. 

Dear Brother: Your letter of the 22d is just re- 
ceived. Your proposal about selling the east forty acres 
of land is all that I want or could want for myself; but 
I am not satisfied with it on mother's account — I want 
her to have her living, and I feel that it is my duty, to 
some extent, to see that she is not wronged. She had a 
right of dower (that is, the use of one-third for life) in 
the other two forties ! but, it seems, she has already let 
you take that, hook and line. She now has the use of 
the whole east forty, as long as she lives; and if it be 
sold, of course, she is entitled to the interest on all the 
money it brings, as long as she lives; but you propose 
to sell it for three hundred dollars, take one hundred 
away with you, and leave her two hundred at 8 per cent, 
making her the enormous sum of 16 dollars a year. Now, 
if you are satisfied with treating her in that way, I am 
not. It is true, that you are to have that forty for two 
hundred dollars, at your mother's death ; but you are 



70 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

not to have it before. I am confident that land can be 
made to produce for mother at least $30 a year, and I 
cannot, to oblige any living person, consent that she shall 
be put on an allowance of sixteen dollars a year. 
Yours, etc., 

A. Lincoln 

In the years between 1849 and 1854, Lincoln's practice grew 
rapidly, but since he cared little for money, his fees were so 
small as to excite the displeasure of his brethren of the bar 
and even to bring a protest from the presiding judge. His 
only political activity was as candidate for presidential elector 
in 1852. He was never effective where his heart was not, and 
the Whig platform of 1852, which had no fighting issue, excited 
in him no particular interest. He had thrown himself with 
renewed enthusiasm into fresh study of the law and was bidding 
fair, if nothing should prevent, to become possibly a great 
lawyer. Interestingly enough, he was now studying and master- 
ing Euclidean geometry, which gave him probably, even at this 
mature age, a power of closer reasoning. Although increas- 
ingly a student he did not withdraw from contact with the 
people. In fact he became during this period the idol of the 
Eighth Judicial Circuit in Illinois and increasingly well-known 
to the entire state. Here were formed the personal associa- 
tions which did so much to make Lincoln, with all his handi- 
caps, the Republican nominee for President in 1860. 

The Compromise of 1850 had apparently settled the slavery 
question, for that generation at least, and while Lincoln was 
firm in the conviction that "nothing is really ever settled until 
it is settled right," and while his dislike of slavery had not 
lessened, he had, as a practical matter, dismissed the question 
from his mind, when the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 
with its repeal of the Missouri Compromise, reopened the 
whole question in a new form, and ushered in a new period in 
his life. 



II 

FIGHTING THE EXTENSION OF 
SLAVERY 



II 

FIGHTING THE EXTENSION OF SLAVERY 

In this second period of his life, Lincoln devoted practically 
all his time and thought to opposing the extension of slavery 
into the territories of the United States. With slavery where 
it already existed he did not quarrel. Believing that it was a 
great evil, he nevertheless was convinced that under the Con- 
stitution of the United States it v.as entitled to protection. 
But quite different was his attitude as regarded its spread. 
It was to him more than a political question, and he never 
overlooked its possibilities in that respect; it was a moral 
question of the highest importance, and to the contest he gave 
all the strength that he had. In the contest he grew and 
developed more rapidly than he had ever done. 

By the Ordinance of 1787, providing for the government of 
the Northwest Territory, it was provided that "there shall be 
neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said Territory, 
otherwise than in punishment of crimes, whereof the party 
shall have been duly convicted." As a result, the states of 
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin were free of 
slavery. In 1803 the United vStates purchased Louisiana, in 
part of which slavery already existed. Louisiana was admitted 
as a slave state in 1812, and in 1818 the people of Missouri 
petitioned Congress to be admitted as a slave state. In the 
North great opposition develo})ed, and the House of Repre- 
sentatives and Senate were at a deadlock, the former insisting 
upon admission only upon the condition of the gradual emanci- 
pation of slaves, and the latter insisting that it should be a 
slave state. Finally, upon the suggestion of Senator Thomas 
of Illinois, Missouri was admitted as a slave state, but in all 
the rest of the Louisiana Purchase, north of 36° 30', which 
was the southern boundary of Missouri, slavery was forever 
prohibited. This not only determined the status of the 

73 



74 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

northern portion of the Louisiana Purchase, but it was a 
recognition of the right of Congress to deal with slavery in the 
territories. LTnder it there was little question of slavery ex- 
tension until the Mexican War. 

As a result of the Mexican War, the slavery question was 
reopened in Congress. California was particularly adapted 
for slavery, and there was an immediate demand from the 
South that the Missouri Compromise line be extended to the 
Pacific. The North still advocated the principle of the Wilmot 
Proviso that slavery should not extend to the new territory. 
At the same time there was a strong Northern demand for the 
abolition of slavery, or at least of the slave-trade, in the 
District of Columbia, while the South, which was losing two 
thousand slaves a year through the operations of the Under- 
ground Railway, demanded a more eifective law for the return 
of fugitive slaves. In addition there were other questions, all 
connected, directly or indirectly, with slavery, which were 
agitated in Congress, such as the western boundary of Texas, 
and whether Utah and New Mexico should be free or slave. 

The discovery of gold in California in 1848 carried a flood 
of settlers there, and, without waiting for the establishment of 
a territorial government, they drew up a state constitution 
which prohibited slavery, and in 1849 applied for admission 
to the Union. Admission would of course prevent the exten- 
sion of the Compromise line to the Pacific, and the South 
opposed admission for this reason. The dispute grew so < 
angry that there was serious danger of disunion, when Henry 
Clay, w^ho had returned to the Senate for the purpose, proposed 
a series of compromise measures, which were finally adopted 
and which, together, form the Compromise of 1850. Under 
these acts California was admitted as a free state, New Mexico 
was given territory claimed by Texas, and in return debts 
of the state of Texas to the amount of $10,000,000 were assumed 
by the United States, while Utah and New Mexico were 
given territorial government with the provision that when 
either should be admitted as a state "the said territory . . . 
shall be admitted into the Union, with or without slavery, as 
their constitution may provide at the time of admission/' 
This was a recognition of the principle of "popular sov- 
ereignty" which General Lewis Cass of Michigan had sug- 
gested as a way of settlement. In addition the slave-trade was 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 75 

abolished in the District of Columbia, and a new and more 
stringent fugitive slave law was passed. 

Both political parties accepted the compromise and agreed 
not to discuss slavery further. National discussion did for a 
short time largely cease. But the new fugitive slave law was 
very unpopular in the North, and in every free state, except 
two, laws were passed to interfere with its operation. In 
addition its execution was frequently interrupted by mobs, 
backed by public sentiment. This angered the Soutli, which 
felt that the North was- unwilling to grant the protection 
guaranteed by the Constitution. 

With the development of overland trade to California 
which began in 1849, came a demand for the organization of 
the territory west of the Missouri River, which now was 
being slowly settled. In June, 1834, Stephen A. Douglas, 
who was chairman of the committee on the territories in the 
Senate, introduced a bill for the organization of the Nebraska 
Territory, with the provision that the people of the territory 
should decide whether or not it should have slavery. This 
fresh application of "popular sovereignty," or, as it was 
popularly called, "squatter sovereignty," was at once opposed 
as contrary to the Missouri Compromise. Douglas contended 
tliat the Compromise of 1850 had set aside the earlier com- 
promise, and later included in the bill a specific provision for 
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. At the same time 
provision was made in the bill for two territories instead of 
one: Kansas, which was clearly intended to be slave, and 
Nebraska, which was to be free, thus maintaining the tradi- 
tional balance between slave and free states. 

This Kansas-Nebraska Bill, with its "popular sovereignty" 
plan, represented the ideas of many people in the West who 
in their adoration of democratic, popular government, thought 
that the people most nearly concerned should decide political 
questions. These people saw here a local question, like that of 
schools; they failed utterly to see that any question which 
involved a policy toward slavery was necessarily national in 
its scope. They also failed to see that it involved any moral 
question. 

The bill was passed, in spite of sharp opposition in the 
North. A large part of the Democratic party, the Anti- 
Nebraska men, refused to support it, and so unpopular was 



76 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

the bill that Douglas said that his way home from Washington 
was lighted all the distance "by Stephen A. Douglas, burning 
in effigy." When he reached Chicago he attempted to defend 
his course in a public- speech and was hissed from the plat- 
form. But each day he roused more enthusiasm and won back 
friends. This was the situation in Illinois and the nation when 
Lincoln came actively back into politics. 

The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill inevitably brought 
Lincoln into politics. To him the issue involved was moral 
rather than political, and it was in the discussion of such 
questions that his powers and abilities lay. He threw him- 
self into a close study of the whole question. The following 
notes show the trend of his thought. They are chiefly inter- 
esting because they contain the germ of many of the argu- 
ments which he was to use later in a more developed form. 



THE NATURE AND OBJECTS OF GOVERNMENT, 
WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO SLAVERY 

[About July 1, 1854] 

[Fragmentary Notes] 

Government is a combination of the people of a coun- 
try to effect certain objects by joint effort. The best 
framed and best administered governments are neces- 
sarily expensive; while by errors in frame and maladmin- 
istration most of them are more onerous than they need 
be^ and some of them very oppressive. Why, then, 
should we have government? Why not each individual 
take to himself the whole fruit of his labor, without 
having any of it taxed away, in services, corn, or money.'' 
Why not take just so much land as he can cultivate with 
his own hands, without buying it of anyone? 

The legitimate object of government is "to do for the 
people what needs to be done, but which they cannot, by 
individual effort, do at all, or do so well, for themselves." 
There are many such things — some of them exist inde- 
pendently of the injustice in the world. Making and 
maintaining roads, bridges, and the like; providing for 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 77 

the helpless young and afflicted; common schools; and 
disposing of deceased men's property, are instances. 

But a far larger class of objects springs from the 
injustice of men. If one people will make war upon 
another, it is a necessity with that other to unite and 
cooperate for defense. Hence the military department. 
If some men will kill, or beat, or constrain others, or 
despoil them of property, by force, fraud, or non-com- 
pliance with contracts, it is a common object with peace- 
ful and just men to prevent it. Hence the criminal and 
j civil departments. 

The legitimate object of government is to do for a 
community of people whatever they need to have done, 
but cannot do at all, or cannot so well do, for themselves, 
in their separate and individual capacities. In all that 
the people can individually do as well for themselves, 
government ought not to interfere. The desirable things 
which the individuals of a people cannot do, or cannot 
well do, for themselves, fall into two classes: those which 
have relation to wrongs, and those which have not. Each 
of these branches off into an infinite variety of sub- 
divisions. 

The first — that in relation to wrongs — embraces all 
crimes, misdemeanors, and non-performance of contracts. 
The other embraces all which, in its nature, and without 
wrong requires combined action, as public roads and 
highways, public schools, charities, pauperism, orphan- 
age, estates of the deceased, and the machinerjr of gov- 
ernment itself. 

From this it appears that if all men were just, there 
still would be some, though not so much, need of govern- 
ment. 

Equality in society alike beats inequality, whether the 
latter be of the British aristocratic sort or of the domestic 
slavery'' sort. 

We know Southern men declare that their slaves are 



78 SELECTIONS FROJM LINCOLN 

better off than hired laborers amongst us. How little 
they know whereof they speak! There is no permanent 
class of hired laborers amongst us. Twenty-five years 
ago I was a hired laborer. The hired laborer of yester- 
day labors on his own account today, and will hire others 
to labor for him tomorrow. 

Advancement — improvement in condition — is the order 
of things in a society of equals. As labor is the com- 
mon burden of our race, so the effort of some to shift 
their share of the burden on to the shoulders of others 
is the great durable curse of the race. Originally a curse 
for transgression upon the whole race, when, as by 
slavery, it is concentrated on a part only, it becomes the 
double-refined curse of God upon his creatures. 

Free labor has the inspiration of hope; pure slavery 
has no hope. The power of hope upon human exertion 
and happiness is wonderful. The slave-master himself 
has a conception of it, and hence the system of tasks 
among slaves. The slave whom you cannot drive witli 
the lash to break seventy-five pounds of hemp in a day, 
if you will task him to break a hundred, and promise him 
pay for all he does over, he will break you a hundred and 
aity. You have substituted hope for the rod. And yet 
perhaps it does not occur to you that, to the extent of 
your gain in the case, you have given up the slave system 
and adopted the free system of labor. 



If A can prove, however conclusively, that he may of 
right enslave B, why may not B snatch the same argu- 
ment and prove equally that he may enslave A.'^ You 
say A is white and B is black. It is color, then; the 
lighter having the right to enslave the darker? Take 
care. By this rule you are to be slave to the first man 
you meet with a fairer skin than your own. 

You do not mean color exactly ? You mean the whites 
are intellectually the superiors of the blacks, and there- 
fore have the right to enslave them? Take care again. 



i 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 79 

By this rule you are to be slave to the first man you meet 
with an intellect superior to your own. 

But, say you, it is a question of interest, and if you 
make it your interest you have the right to enslave an- 
other. Very well. And if he can make it his interest 
he has the right to enslave you. 



The ant who has toiled and dragged a crumb to his 
nest will furiously defend the fruit of his labor against 
whatever robber assails him. So plain that the most 
dumb and stupid slave that ever toiled for a master does 
constantly know that he is wronged. So plain that no 
one, high or low, ever does mistake it, except in a plainly 
selfish way; for although volume upon volume is written 
to prove slavery a very good thing, we never hear of 
the man who wishes to take the good of it by being a 
slave himself. 

Most governments have been based, practically, on the 
denial of the equal rights of men, as I have, in part, 
stated them ; ours began by affirming these rights. They 
said some men are too ignorant and vicious to share in 
government. Possibly so, said we; and, by your system, 
you would always keep them ignorant and vicious. We 
proposed to give all a chance ; and we expected the weak 
to grow stronger, the ignorant wiser, and all better and 
happier together. 

We made the experiment, and the fruit is before us. 
Look at it, think of it. Look at it in its aggregate 
grandeur, of extent, of country, and numbers of popula- 
tion — of ship and steamboat, and railroad. 

Lincoln did not content himself with study. He went on 
the stump in behalf of a friend who was a candidate for Con- 
gress, stating that he would only speak in opposition to the 
Kansas-Nebraska act. He also began to write letters with 
the view of organization of public opinion against it. The 
following is a good example of these: 



80 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO JOHN 3/. PALMER 

Springfield, September 7, 1854 
Hon. J. M. Palmer. 

Dear Sir: You know how anxious I am that this 
Nebraska measure shall be rebuked and condemned 
everywhere. Of course I hope something from your posi- 
tion, yet I do not expect you to do anything which may 
be wrong in your own judgment; nor would I have you 
do anything personally injurious to yourself. You are, 
and always have been, honestly and sincerely, a demo- 
crat; and I know how painful it must be to an honest, 
sincere man to be urged by his party to the support of 
a measure, which in his conscience he believes to be 
wrong. You have had a severe struggle with yourself, 
and you have determined not to swallow the wrong. Is 
it not just to yourself that you should, in a few public 
speeches, state your reasons^ and thus justify yourself.'* 
I wish you would; and yet I say, "Don't do it, if you 
think it will injure you." — You may have given your 
word to vote for Major Harris;* and if so, of course 
3^ou will stick to it. — But allow me to suggest that you 
should avoid speaking of this, for it probably would 
induce some of your friends, in like manner, to cast their 
votes. — You understand. — And now let me beg your 
pardon for obtruding this letter upon you, to whom I 
have ever been opposed in politics. — Had your party 
omitted to make Nebraska a test of party fidelity, you 
probably would have been the Democratic candidate for 
Congress in the district. — You deserved it, and I believe 
it would have been given you. — In that case I should 
have been quite happy that Nebraska was to be rebuked 
at all events. — I still should have voted for the Whig 
candidate; but I should' have made no speeches, written 
no letters; and you would have been elected by at least 
a thousand majority. Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

* Thomas L. Harris, the Democratic candidate for Congress. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 81 

The State Fair, held in October at Springfield, always 
attracted huge crowds, and Douglas arranged to speak there 
on October 3, in defense of his policy. Lincoln, who was 
now a candidate for the legislature, was promptly called upon 
to answer him and did so on the next day. His speech was 
very successful. Of it the Springfield Journal said: 

"The Anti-Nebraska speech of Mr. Lincoln was the pro- 
foundest, in our opinion, that he has made in his whole life. 
He felt upon his soul the truths burn which he uttered, and all 
present felt that he was true to his own soul. His feelings 
once or twice swelled within and came near stifling utterance. 
He quivered with emotion. The whole house was still as death. 
He attacked the Nebraska bill with unusual warmth and 
energy; and all felt that a man of strength was its enemy and 
that he intended to blast it if he could by strong and manly 
eiforts. He was most successful, and the house approved the 
glorious triumph of truth by loud and continued huzzas." 

Douglas replied the following day and these speeches may 
be said to be the beginning of the series of debates which was 
to last almost without interruption until 1860. Lincoln's speech 
was not published, but when he spoke at Peoria twelve days 
later in reply to Douglas he used substantially the same argu- 
ments, lacking, possibly, the fire of the Springfield speech. 

The Peoria address is also notable because it contains the 
germ of many arguments and illustrations that he was to use 
during the next six years. In spite of the fact that it was 
written when Lincoln was in the process of finding himself, 
it is far superior to his speeches in the much more famous 
debates with Douglas in 1858. It is more imaginative, has 
greater elevation of thought, and is franker and more convinc- 
ing. It is a fine example of brief, direct, and terse statement. 
His major plea was for the vindication and restoration of the 
policy of the fathers of the republic toward slavery, but here, 
too, is made clearly the chief point of all his speeches of this 
period — that slavery was fundamentally wrong; that while it 
could not be disturbed where it already existed, it must be 
confined there and not allowed to spread at all into free terri- 
tory. It is notable also for its spirit of fairness toward the 
Southern people. 



82 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

THE PEORIA SPEECH 
[October 16, 1851] 

I do not rise to speak now, if I can stipulate with the 
audience to meet me here at half-past six or at seven 
o'clock. It is now several minutes past five, and Judge 
Douglas has spoken over three hours. If you hear me 
at all, I wish you to hear me through. It will take me 
as long as it has taken him. That will carry us beyond 
eight o'clock at night. Now, everyone of you who can 
remain that long can just as well get his supper, meet 
me at seven, and remain an hour or two later. The Judge 
has already informed you that he is to have an hour to 
reply to me. I doubt not but you have been a little sur- 
prised to learn that I have consented to give one of his 
high reputation and known ability this advantage of me. 
Indeed, my consenting to it, though reluctant, was not 
wholly unselfish, for I suspected, if it were understood 
that the Judge was entirely done, you Democrats would 
leave and not hear me; but by giving him the close I 
felt confident you would stay for the fun of hearing him 
skin me. 

[The audience signified their assent to the arrange- 
ment, and adjourned to seven o'clock p. m., at which time 
they reassembled, and Mr. Lincoln spoke substantially 
as follows:] 

The repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and the 
propriety of its restoration, constitute the subject of 
what I am about to say. As I desire to present my own 
connected view of this subject, my remarks will not be 
specifically an answer to Judge Douglas; yet, as I pro- 
ceed, the main points he has presented will arise, and 
will receive such respectful attention as I may be able 
to give them. I wish further to say that I do not propose 
to question the patriotism or to assail the motives of any 
man or class of men, but rather to confine myself strictly 
to the naked merits of the question. I also wish to be 
no less than national in all the positions I may take, and 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 83 

whenever I take ground which others have thought, or 
may think^ narrow, sectional, and dangerous to the 
union, I hope to give a reason which will appear suffi- 
cient, at least to some, why I think differently. 

And as this subject is no other than part and parcel 
of the larger general question of domestic slavery, I wish 
to make and keep the distinction between the existing 
institution and the extension of it, so broad and so clear 
that no honest man can misunderstand me, and no dis- 
honest one successfully misrepresent me. 

In order to a clear understanding of what the Mis- 
souri Compromise is, a short history of the preceding 
kindred subjects will perhaps be proper. 

When we established our independence, we did not 
own or claim the country to which this compromise ap- 
plies. Indeed, strictly speaking, the Confederacy then 
owned no country at all; the states respectively owned 
the country within their limits, and some of them owned 
territory beyond their strict state limits. Virginia thus 
owned the Northwestern Territory — the country out of 
which the principal part of Ohio, all Indiana, all Illinois, 
all Michigan, and all Wisconsin have since been formed. 
She also owned (perhaps within her then limits) what 
has since been formed into the State of Kentucky. North 
Carolina thus owned what is now the State of Tennessee ; 
and South Carolina and Georgia owned, in separate 
parts, what are now Mississippi and Alabama. Con- 
necticut, I think, owned the little remaining part of Ohio, 
being the same where they now send Giddings to Con- 
gress, and beat all creation in making cheese. 

These territories, together with the states themselves, 
constitute all the country over which the Confederacy 
then claimed any sort of jurisdiction. We were then 
living under the Articles of Confederation, which were 
superseded by the Constitution several years afterwards. 
The question of ceding the territories to the General 
Government was set on foot. Mr. Jefferson, the author 



84 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of the Declaration of Independence, and otherwise a 
chief actor in the Revolution ; then a delegate in Con- 
gress; afterwards, twice President; who was, is, and 
perhaps will continue to be, the most distinguished poli- 
tician of our history ; a Virginian by birth and continued 
residence, and withal a slaveholder — conceived the idea 
of taking that occasion to prevent slavery ever going into 
the Northwestern Territory. He prevailed on the Vir- 
ginia legislature to adopt his views, and to cede the 
Territory, making the prohibition of slavery therein a 
condition of the deed.* Congress accepted the cession 
with the condition; and the first ordinance (which the 
acts of Congress were then called) for the government 
of the Territory provided that slavery should never be 
permitted therein. This is the famed "Ordinance of 
'87," so often spoken of. 

Thenceforward for sixty-one years, and until, in 1848, 
the last scrap of this Territory came into the Union as 
the State of Wisconsin^ all parties acted in quiet obedi- 
ence to this ordinance. It is now what Jefferson foresaw 
and intended — the happy home of teeming millions of 
free, white, prosperous people, and no slave among them. 

Thus, with the author of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, the policy of prohibiting slavery in new terri- 
tory originated. Thus, away back to the Constitution, 
in the pure, fresh, free breath of the Revolution, the 
State of Virginia and the National Congress put that 
policy into practice. Thus, through more than sixty of 
the best years of the republic, did that policy steadily 
work to its great and beneficent end. And thus, in those 
five states, and in five millions of free, enterprising 
people, we have before us the rich fruits of this policy. 

But now new light breaks upon us. Now Congress 
declares this ought never to have been, and the like of it 
must never be again. The sacred right of self-govern- 
ment is grossly violated by it. We even find some men 

* This was an error which Lincoln later corrected. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 85 

who drew their first breath — and every other breath of 
their lives — under this very restriction, now live in dread 
of absolute suffocation if they should be restricted in the 
"sacred right" of taking slaves to Nebraska. That per- 
fect liberty they sigh for — the liberty of making slaves 
of other people — Jefferson never thought of, their own 
fathers never thought of, they never thought of them- 
selves, a year ago. How fortunate for them they did not 
sooner become sensible of their great misery ! Oh, how 
difficult it is to treat with respect such assaults upon all 
we have ever really held sacred ! 

But to return to history. In 1 803 we purchased what 
was then called Louisiana, of France. It included the 
present states of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, and 
Iowa; also the territory of Minnesota, and the present 
bone of contention, Kansas and Nebraska. Slavery al- 
ready existed among the French at New Orleans, and to 
some extent at St. Louis. In 1812 Louisiana came into 
the Union as a slave state without controversy. In 1818 
or '19, Missouri showed signs of a wish to come in with 
slavery. This was resisted by Northern members of 
Congress ; and thus began the first great slavery agitation 
in the nation. This controversy lasted several months, 
and became very angry and exciting — the House of Rep- 
resentatives voting for the prohibition of slavery in 
Missouri, and the Senate voting as steadily against it. 
Threats of the breaking up of the Union were freely 
made, and the ablest public men of the day became seri- 
ously alarmed. At length a compromise was made, in 
which, as in all compromises, both sides yielded some- 
thing. It was a law passed on the 6th of March, 1820, 
providing that Missouri might come into the Union with 
slavery, but that in all the remaining part of the terri- 
tory purchased of France, which lies north of thirt}'- 
six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude, slavery 
should never be permitted. This provision of law is the 
"Missouri Compromise." In excluding slavery north of 



86 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

the line, the same language is employed as in the ordi- 
nance of 1787. It directly applied to Iowa, Minnesota, 
and to the present bone of contention, Kansas and 
Nebraska. Whether there should or should not be slavery 
south of that line, nothing was said in the law. But 
Arkansas constituted the principal remaining part south 
of the line; and it has since been admitted as a slave 
state, without serious controversy. More recently, Iowa, 
north of the line, came in as a free state without con- 
troversy. Still later, Minnesota, north of the line, had 
a territorial organization without controversy. Texas, 
principally south of the line, and west of Arkansas, 
though originally within the purchase frt)m France, had, 
in 1819, been traded off to Spain in our treaty for the 
acquisition of Florida. It had thus become a part of 
Mexico. Mexico revolutionized and became independent 
of Spain. American citizens began settling rapidly with 
their slaves in the southern part of Texas. Soon they 
revolutionized against Mexico, and established an inde- 
pendent government of their own, adopting a constitution 
with slavery^ strongly resembling the constitutions of our 
slave states. By still another rapid move, Texas, claim- 
ing a boundary much further west than when we parted 
with her in 1819, was brought back to the United States, 
and admitted into the Union as a slave state. Then 
there was little or no settlement in the northern part of 
Texas, a considerable portion of which lay north of the 
Missouri line; and in the resolutions admitting her into 
the Union, the Missouri restriction was expressly ex- 
tended westward across her territory. This was in 1845, 
only nine years ago. 

Thus originated the Missouri Compromise; and thus 
has it been respected down to 1845. And even four 
years later, in 1849, our distinguished senator, in a 
public address, held the following language in relation 
to it: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 87 

If "The Missouri Compromise has been in practical oper- 
ation for about a quarter of a century, and has received 
the sanction and apj^robation of men of all parties in 
every section of the Union. It has allayed all sectional 
jealousies and irritations growing out of this vexed ques- 
tion, and harmonized and tranquilized the whole country. 
It has given to Henry Clay, as its prominent champion, 
the proud sobriquet of the 'Great Pacificator,' and by 
that title, and for that service, his political friends had 
repeatedly appealed to the people to rally under his 
standard as a presidential candidate, as the man who 
had exhibited the patriotism and power to suppress an 
unholy and treasonable agitation, and preserve the 
Union. He was not aware that any man or any party, 
from any section of the Union, had ever urged as an 
objection to Mr. Clay that he was the great champion 
of the Missouri Compromise. On the contrary, the e&ovt 
was made by the opponents of Mr. Clay to prove that 
he was not entitled to the exclusive m.erit of that great 
patriotic measure; and that the honor was equally due 
to others, as well as to him for securing its adoption — 
that it had its origin in the hearts of all patriotic men 
who desired to preserve and perpetuate the blessings of 
our glorious Union — an origin akin to that of the Con- 
stitution of the United States, conceived in the same 
spirit of fraternal aifection, and calculated to remove 
forever the only danger which seemed to threaten, at 
some distant day, to sever the social bond of union. All 
the evidences of public opinion at that day seemed to in- 
dicate that this Compromise had been canonized in the 
hearts of the American people, as a sacred thing which 
no ruthless hand would ever be reckless enough to dis- 
turb." 

I do not read this extract to involve Judge Douglas in 
an inconsistency. If he afterwards thought he had been 
wrong, it was right for him to change. I bring this for- 



88 SELECTIONS FROIVI LINCOLN 

ward merely to show the high estimate placed on the 
Missouri Comj^romise by ail parties up to so late as the 
year 1849. 

But going back a little in point of time. Our war 
with Mexico broke out in 1816. When Congress was 
about adjourning that session, President Polk asked them 
to place two millions of dollars under his control, to be 
used by him in the recess, if found practicable and expe- 
dient, in negotiating a treaty of peace with Mexico, and 
acquiring some part of her territory. A bill was duly 
gotten up for the purpose, and was progressing swim- 
mingly in the House of Representatives, when a member 
by the name of David Wilmot, a Democrat from Pennsyl- 
vania, moved as an amendment, "Provided, that in any 
territory thus acquired there shall never be slavery." 

This is the origin of the far-famed Wilmot proviso. It 
created a great flutter; but it stuck like wax, was voted 
into the bill, and the bill passed with it through the 
House. The Senate, however, adjourned without final 
action on it, and so both appropriation and proviso were 
lost for the time. The war continued, and at the next 
session, the President renewed his request for the appro- 
priation, enlarging the amount, I think, to three millions. 
Again came the proviso, and defeated the measure. Con- 
gress adjourned again, and the war went on. In Decem- 
ber, 1847, the new Congress assembled. I was in the 
lower House that term. The Wilmot proviso, or the 
principle of it, was constantly coming up in some shape 
or other, and I think I may venture to say I voted for it 
at least forty times during the short time I was there. 
The Senate, however^ held it in check, and it never be- 
came a law. In the spring of 1848 a treaty of peace 
was made with Mexico, by which we obtained that por- 
tion of her country which now constitutes the Territories 
of New Mexico and Utah, and the present State of Cali- 
fornia. By this treaty the Wilmot proviso was defeated, 
in so far as it was intended to be a condition of the 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 89 

qnisition of territory. Its friends, however, were still 
determined to find some way to restrain slavery from 
getting into the new country. This new acquisition lay 
directly west of our old purchase from France, and ex- 
tended west to the Pacific Ocean, and was so situated 
that if the Missouri line should be extended straight 
west, the new country would be divided by such extended 
line, leaving some north and some south of it. On Judge 
Douglas's motion, a bill, or provision of a bill, passed 
the Senate to so extend the Missouri line. The proviso 
men in the House, including myself, voted it down, be- 
cause, bj^ implication, it gave up the southern part to 
slavery, while we were bent on having it all free. 

In the fall of 1848 the gold mines were discovered in 
California. This attracted people to it with unprece- 
dented rapidity, so that on, or soon after, the meeting of 
the new Congress in December, 1849, she already had a 
population of nearly a hundred thousand, had called a 
convention, formed a State Constitution excluding slav- 
ery, and was knocking for admission into the Union. 
The proviso men, of course, were for letting her in, but 
the Senate, always true to the other side, would not 
consent to her admission, and there California stood, 
kept out of the Union because she would not let slavery 
into her borders. Under all the circumstances, perhaps, 
this was not wrong. There were other points of dispute 
connected with the general question of slavery, which 
equally needed adjustment. The South clamored for a 
more efficient fugitive-slave law. The North clamored 
for the abolition of a peculiar species of slave-trade in 
the District of Columbia, in connection with which, in 
view from the windows of the Capitol, a sort of negro 
livery stable, where droves of negroes were collected, 
temporarily kept, and finally taken to Southern markets, 
precisely like droves of horses, had been openly main- 
tained for fifty years. Utah and New Mexico needed 
territorial government ; and whether slavery should or 



90 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

should not be prohibited within them was another ques- 
tion. The indefinite M^estern boundary of Texas was to 
be settled. She was a slave state, and consequently the 
farther west the slavery men could push the boundary, 
the more slave country could be secured ; and the farther 
east the slavery opponents could thrust the boundary 
back, the less slave ground was secured. Thus this was 
just as clearly a slavery question as any of the others. 

These points all needed adjustment, and they were 
held up, perhaps wisely, to make them help adjust one 
another. The Union now, as in 1820, was thought to 
be in danger, and devotion to the Union rightfully in- 
clined men to yield somewhat in points, where nothing 
else could have so inclined them. A compromise was 
finally effected. The South got their new fugitive-slave 
law, and the North got California (by far the best part 
of our acquisition from Mexico) as a free state. The 
South got a provision that New Mexico and Utah, when 
admitted as states, may come in with or without slavery 
as they may then choose; and the North got the slave- 
trade abolished in the District of Columbia. The North 
got the western boundary of Texas thrown farther back 
eastward than the South desired ; but, in turn, they gave 
Texas ten millions of dollars with which to pay her old 
debts. This is the compromise of 1850. 

Preceding the presidential election of 1852, each of 
the great political parties. Democrats and Whigs, met in 
convention and adopted resolutions indorsing the com- 
promise of '50, as a "finality," a final settlement, so far 
as these parties could make it so, of all slavery agitatio> 
Previous to this, in 1851, the Illinois legislature had in- 
dorsed it. 

During this long period of time, Nebraska had re- 
mained substantially an uninhabited country, but now 
emigration to and settlement within it began to take 
place. It is about one-third as large as the present 
United States, and its importance, so long overlooked. 



f 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 91 

begins to come to view. The restriction of slavery by 
the Missouri Compromise directly applies to it — in fact 
was first madC;, and has since been maintained, expressly 
for it. In 1853; a bill to give it a territorial govern- 
ment passed the House of Representatives, and, in the 
hands of Judge Douglas, failed of passing only for want 
of time. This bill contained no repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise. Indeed, when it was assailed because it 
did not contain such repeal, Judge Douglas de- 
fended it in its existing form. On January 4, 
1854, Judge Douglas introduces a new bill to 
give Nebraska territorial government. He accom- 
panies this bill with a report, in which last he 
expressly recommends that the Missouri Compromise 
shall neither be affirmed nor repealed. Before long the 
bill is so modified as to make two territories instead of 
one, calling the southern one Kansas. 

Also, about a month after the introduction of the bill, 
on the Judge's own motion it is so amended as to declare 
the Missouri Compromise inoperative and void; and, 
substantially, that the people who go and settle there 
may establish slavery, or exclude it, as they may see fit. 
In this shape the bill passed both branches of Congress 
and became a law. 

This is the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The 
foregoing history may not be precisely accurate in every 
particular, but I am sure it is sufficiently so for all the 
use I shall attempt to make of it, and in it we have 
before us the chief material enabling us to judge cor- 
rectly whether the repeal of the Missouri Compromise is 
right or wrong. I think, and shall try to show, that it is 
wrong — wrong in its direct effect, letting slavery into 
Kansas and Nebraska, and wrong in its prospective prin- 
ciple, allowing it to spread to every other part of the 
wide world where men can be found inclined to take it. 

This declared indifference, but, as I must think, covert 
real zeal, for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate. 



92 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery 
itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican 
example of its just influence in the world; enables the 
enemies of free institutions with plausibility to taunt us 
as hypocrites; causes the real friends of freedom to 
doubt our sincerity; and especially because it forces so 
many good men among ourselves into an open war with 
the very fundamental principles of civil liberty, criticiz- 
ing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that 
there is no right principle of action but self-interest. 

Before proceeding let me say that I think I have no 
prejudice against the Southern people. They are just 
what we would be in their situation. If slavery did not 
now exist among them, they would not introduce it. If 
it did now exist among us, we should not instantly give it 
up. This I believe of the masses North and South. 
Doubtless there are individuals on both sides who would 
not hold slaves under any circumstances, and others who 
would gladly introduce slavery anew if it were out of 
existence. We know that some Southern men do free 
their slaves, go North and become tiptop abolitionists, 
while some Northern ones go South and become most 
cruel slave masters. 

When Southern people tell us they are no more re- 
sponsible for the origin of slavery than we are, I 
acknowledge the fact. When it is said that the institu- 
tion exists, and that it is very difficult to get rid of it in < 
any satisfactory way, I can understand and appreciate < 
the saying. I surely will not blame them for not doing ^ 
what I should not know how to do myself. If all earthly ; 
power were given me, I should not know what to do as to 
the existing institution. My first impulse would be to 
free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia, to their 
own native land. But a moment's reflection would con- 
vince me that whatever of high hope (as I think there is) 
there may be in this in the long run, its sudden execution 
is impossible. If they were all landed there in a day, 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 93 

tlicy would all perish in the next ten days; and there are 
not surplus shipping and surplus money enough to carry 
them there in many times ten days. What then ? Free 
theni all, and keep them among us as underlings ? Is it 
quite certain that this betters their condition? I think 
I would not hold one in slavery at any rate, yet the point 
is not clear enough for me to denounce people upon. 
What next? Free them, and make them politically and 
socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of 
this, and if mine would, we well know that those of the 
great mass of whites will not. Whether this feeling 
accords with justice and sound judgment is not the sole 
question, if indeed it is any part of it. A universal 
feeling, whether well or ill founded, cannot be safely 
disregarded. We cannot then make them equals. It 
does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation 
might be adopted, but for their tardiness in this I will 
not undertake to judge our brethren of the South. 

When they remind us of their constitutional rights, I 
acknowledge them — not grudgingly, but fully and fairly ; 
and I would give them any legislation for the reclaiming 
of their fugitives which should not in its stringency be 
more likely to carry a free man into slavery than our 
ordinary criminal laws are to hang an innocent one. 

But all this, to my judgment, furnishes no more excuse 
for permitting slavery to go into our own free territory 
than it would for reviving the African slave trade by 
law. The law which forbids the bringing of slaves from 
Africa, and that which has so long forbidden the taking 
of them into Nebraska, can hardly be distinguished on 
any moral principle, and the repeal of the former could 
find quite as plausible excuses as that of the latter. 

The arguments by which the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise is sought to be justified are these: First, 
That the Nebraska country needed a territorial govern- 
ment; Second, That in various ways the public had 
j repudiated that compromise and demanded the repeal. 



94 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and therefore should not now complain of it; and7 
Lastly, That the repeal establishes a principle which is- 
intrinsically right. 

I will attempt an answer to each of them in its turn. 
First, then. If that country was in need of a territorial 
organization, could it not have had it as well without as- 
with a repeal? Iowa and Minnesota, to both of which 
the Missouri restriction applied, had, without its repeal, 
each in succession, territorial organizations. And even 
the year before, a bill for Nebraska itself was within an 
ace of passing without the repealing clause, and this in 
the hands of the same men who are now the champions of 
repeal. Why no necessity then for repeal.^ But still 
later, when this very bill was first brought in, it con- 
tained no repeal. But, say they, because the people had 
demanded, or rather commanded, the repeal, the repeal 
was to accompany the organization whenever that should 
occur. 

Now, I deny that the public ever demanded any such 
thing — ever repudiated the Missouri Compromise, ever 
commanded its repeal. I deny it, and call for the proof. 
It is not pontended, I believe, that any such command 
has ever been given in express terms. It is only said 
that it was done in principle. The support of the Wil- 
mot proviso is the first fact mentioned to prove that the 
Missouri restriction was repudiated in principle, and the 
second is the refusal* to extend the Missouri line over the 
country acquired from Mexico. These are near enough 
alike to be treated together. The one was to exclude the 
chances of slavery from the whole new acquisition by 
the lump, and the other was to reject a division of it, by 
which one-half was to be given up to those chances. 
Now, whether this was a repudiation of the Missouri 
line in principle depends upon whether the Missouri law 
contained any principle requiring the line to be extended 
over the country acquired from Mexico. I contend it 
did not. I insist that it contained no general principle, 



m 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 95 

but that it was, in every sense, specific. That its terras 
limit it to the country purchased from France is unde- 
nied and undeniable. It could have no principle beyond 
the intention of those who made it. They did not intend 
to extend the line to country which they did not own. 
If they intended to extend it in the event of acquiring 
additional territory, why did they not say so? It was 
just as easy to say that *'in all the country west of the 
Mississippi which we now own, or may hereafter acquire, 
there shall never be slavery," as to say what they did 
say ; and they would have said it if they had meant it. 
An intention to extend the law is not only not mentioned 
in the law, but is not mentioned in any contemporaneous 
history. Both the law itself, and the history pf the 
times, are a blank as to any principle of extension ; and 
by neither the known rules of construing statutes and 
contracts, nor by common sense, can any such principle 
be inferred. 

Another fact showing the specific character of the 
Missouri law — showing that it intended no more than it 
expressed, showing that the line was not intended as a 
universal dividing line between free and slave territory, 
present and prospective, nortli of which slavery could 
never go — is the fact that by that very law Missouri 
came in as a slave state, north of the line. If that law 
contained any prospective principle, the whole law must 
be looked to in order to ascertain what the principle was. 
And by this rule the South could fairly contend that 
inasmuch as they got one slave state north of the line at 
the inception of the law, they have the right to have 
another given them north of it occasionally, now and 
then, in the indefinite westward extension of the line. 
This demonstrates the absurdity of attempting to deduce 
a prospective principle from the Missouri Compromise 
line. 

When we voted for the Wilmot proviso we were voting 
to keep slavery out of the whole Mexican acquisition. 



96 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and little did we think we were thereby voting to let it 
into Nebraska, lying several hundred miles distant. 
When we voted against extending the Missouri line, 
little did we think we were voting to destroy the old 
line, then of near thirty years' standing. 

To argue that we thus repudiated the Missouri Com- 
promise is no less absurd than it would be to argue that 
because we have so far forborne to acquire Cuba, we 
have thereby, in principle, repudiated our former acqui- 
sitions and determined to throw them out of the Union. 
No less absurd than it would be to say that because I 
may have refused to build an addition to my house, I 
thereby have decided to destro}^ the existing house! 
And if I catch you setting fire to my house, you will turn 
upon me and say I instructed you to do it! 

The most conclusive argument, however, that while 
for the Wilmot proviso, and while voting against the 
extension of the Missouri line, we never thought of dis- 
turbing the original Missouri Compromise, is found in 
the fact that there was then, and still is, an unorganized 
tract of fine country, nearly as large as the State of Mis- 
souri, lying immediately west of Arkansas and south of 
the Missouri Compromise line, and that we never at- 
tempted to prohibit slavery as to it. I wish particular 
attention to this. It adjoins the original Missouri Com- 
promise line by its northern boundary, and consequently 
is part of the country into which by implication slavery 
was permitted to go by that compromise. There it has 
lain open ever since, and there it still lies, and yet no 
effort has been made at any time to wrest it from the 
South. In all our struggles to prohibit slavery within 
our Mexican acquisitions, we never so much as lifted a 
finger to prohibit it as to this tract. Is not this entirely 
conclusive that at all times we have held the Missouri 
Compromise as a sacred thing, even when against our- 
selves as well as when for us? 

Senator Douglas sometimes says the Missouri line 



(SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 97 

itself was in principle only an extension of the line of 
the ordinance of '87 — that is to say, an extension of the 
Ohio River. I think this is weak enough on its face. 
I will remark, however, that, as a glance at the map 
will show, the Missouri line is a long way farther south 
than the Ohio, and that if our senator in proposing his 
extension had stuck to the principle of jogging south- 
w^ird, perhaps it might not have been voted down so 
readily. 

But next it is said that the compromises of '50, and the 
ratification of them by both political parties in '52, 
established a new principle which required the repeal of 
the Missouri Compromise. This again I deny. I deny 
it, and demand the proof. I have already stated fully 
what the compromises of '50 are. That particular part 
of those measures from which the virtual repeal of the 
Missouri Compromise is sought to be inferred (for it is 
admitted they contain nothing about it in express terms) 
is the provision in the Utah and New Mexico laws which 
permits them when they seek admission into the Union 
as states to come in with or without slavery, as they 
shall then see fit. Now I insist this provision was made 
for Utah and New Mexico, and for no other place what- 
ever. It had no more direct reference to Nebraska than 
it had to the territories of the moon. But, say they, it 
had reference to Nebraska in principle. Let us see. 
The North consented to this provision, not because they 
considered it right in itself, but because they were com- 
pensated — paid for it. 

They at the same time got California into the Union 
as a free state. This was far the best part of all they 
had struggled for by the Wilmot proviso. They also 
got the area of slavery somewhat narrowed in the settle- 
ment of the boundary of Texas. Also they got the slave- 
trade abolished in the District of Columbia. 

For all these desirable objects the North could afford 
to yield something; and they did yield to the South the 



98 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Utah and New Mexico provision. I do not mean that 
the whole North, or even a majority, yielded, when the 
law passed ; but enough yielded, when added to the vote 
of the South, to carr}^ the measure. Nor can it be pre- 
tended that the principle of this arrangement requires 
us to permit the same provision to be applied to Ne- 
braska, without any equivalent at all. Give us an- 
other free state; press the boundary of Texas still far- 
ther back; give us another step toward the destruction 
of slavery in the District, and you present us a similar 
case. But ask us not to repeat, for nothing, what you 
paid for in the first instance. If you wish the thing 
again, pay again. That is the principle of the com- 
promises of '50, if, indeed, they had any principles 
beyond their specific terms — it was the system of equiv- 
alents. 

Again, if Congress, at that time, intended that all 
future territories should, when admitted as' states, 
come in with or without slavery, at their own option, 
why did it not say so ? With such a universal provision, 
all know the bills could not have passed. Did they, 
then — could they — establish a principle contrary to their 
own intention? Still further, if they intended to estab- 
lish the principle that, whenever Congress had control, 
it should be left to the people to do as they thought fit 
with slavery, why did they not authorize the people of 
the District of Columbia, at their option, to abolish 
slavery within their limits ? 

I personally know that this has not been left undone 
because it was unthought of. It was frequently spoken 
of by members of Congress, and by citizens of Washing- 
ton, six years ago; and I heard no one express a doubt 
that a system of gradual emancipation, with compensa- 
tion to owners, would meet the approbation of a large 
majority of the white people of the District. But with- 
out the action of Congress they could say nothing; and 
Congress said "No." In the measures of 1850, Con- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 99 

gress had the subject of slavery in the District expressly 
on hand. If they were then establishing the principle 
of allowing the people to do as they please with slavery, 
why did they not apply the principle to that people? 

Again, it is claimed that by the resolutions of the 
Illinois legislature, passed in 1851, the repeal of the 
Missouri Compromise was demanded. This I deny also. 
Whatever may be worked out by a criticism of the 
language of those resolutions, the people have never 
understood them as being any more than an indorsement 
of the compromises of 1850, and a release of our sena- 
tors from voting for the Wilmot proviso. The whole 
people are living witnesses that this only was their 
view. Finally, it is asked, "If we did not mean to 
apply the Utah and New Mexico provision to all future 
territories, what did we mean when we, in 1852, in- 
dorsed the compromises of 1850?" 

For myself I can answer this question most easily. 
I meant not to ask a repeal or modification of the fugi- 
tive-slave law. I meant not to ask for the abolition of 
slavery in the District of Columbia. I meant not to 
resist the admission of Utah and New Mexico, even 
should they ask to come in as slave states. I meant 
nothing about additional territories, because, as I under- 
stood, we then had no territory whose character as to 
slavery was not already settled. As to Nebraska, I 
regarded its character as being fixed by the Missouri 
Compromise for thirty years — as unalterably fixed as 
that of my own home in Illinois. As to new acquisitions, 
I said, "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 
When we make new acquisitions, we will, as heretofore, 
try to manage them somehow. That is my answer ; that 
is what I meant and said ; and I appeal to the people to 
say each for himself, whether that is not also the uni- 
versal meaning of the free states. 

And now, in turn, let me ask a few questions. If, by 
any or all these matters, the repeal of the Missouri Com- 



100 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

promise was commanded, why was not the command 
sooner obeyed? Why was the repeal omitted in the 
Nebraska bill of 1853? Why was it omitted in the 
original bill of 1854? Why in the accompanying report 
was such a repeal characterized as a departure from the 
course pursued in 1850? and its continued omission 
recommended ? 

I am aware Judge Douglas now argues that the sub- 
sequent express repeal is no substantial alteration of 
the bill. This argument seems wonderful to me. It is 
as if one should argue that white and black are not dif- 
ferent. He admits, however, that there is a literal 
change in the bill, and that he made the change in defer- 
ence to other senators who would not support the bill 
without. This proves that those other senators thought 
the change a substantial one, and that the Judge thought 
their opinions worth deferring to. His own opinions, 
therefore, seem not to rest on a very firm basis, even in 
his own mind; and I suppose the world believes, and 
will continue to believe, that precisely on the substance 
of that change this whole agitation has arisen. 

I conclude, then, that the public never demanded the 
repeal of the Missouri Compromise. 

I now come to consider whether the repeal, with its 
avowed principles, is intrinsically right. I insist that 
it is not. Take the particular case. A controversy had 
arisen between the advocates and opponents of slavery, 
in relation to its establishment within the country we had 
purchased of France. The southern, and then best, part 
of the purchase was already in as a slave state. The 
controversy was settled by also letting Missouri in as a 
slave state; but with the agreement that within all the 
remaining part of the purchase, north of a certain line, 
there should never be slavery. As to what was to be 
done with the remaining part south of the line, nothing 
was said ; but perhaps the fair implication was, it should 
come in with slaverv if it should so choose. The south- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 101 

ern part, except a portion heretofore mentioned, after- 
ward did come in with slavery, as the State of Arkansas. 
All these many years, since 1820, the northern part had 
remained a wilderness. At length settlements began in 
it also. In due course Iowa came in as a free state, and 
Minnesota was given a territorial government, without 
removing the slavery restriction. Finally, the sole re- 
maining part north of the line — Kansas and Nebraska — 
was to be organized; and it is proposed, and carried, to 
blot out the old dividing line of thirty-four years' stand- 
ing, and to open the whole of that country to the intro- 
duction of slavery. Now this, to my mind, is manifestly 
unjust. After an angry and dangerous controversy, the 
parties made friends by dividing the bone of contention. 
The one party first appropriates her own share, beyond 
all power to be disturbed in the possession of it, and 
then seizes the share of the other party." It is as if two 
starving men had divided their only loaf; the one had 
hastily swallowed his half, and then grabbed the other's 
half just as he was putting it to his mouth. 

Let me here drop the main argument, to notice what I 
consider rather an inferior matter. It is argued that 
slavery will not go to Kansas and Nebraska, in any 
event. This is a palliation, a lullaby. I have some 
hope that it will not ; but let us not be too confident. As 
to climate, a glance at the map shows that there are five 
slave States — Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, 
and Missouri, and also the District of Columbia, all 
north of the Missouri Compromise line. The census 
returns of 1850 show that within these there are eight 
hundred and sixty-seven thousand two hundred and sev- 
;ent3^-six slaves, being more than one-fourth of all the 
slaves in the nation. 

It is not climate, then, that will keep slavery out of 

these territories. Is there anything in the peculiar 

nature of the country.? Missouri adjoins these terri- 

Stories by her entire western boundary, and slavery is 



102 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

already within every one of her western counties. I 
have even heard it said that there are more slaves in 
proportion to whites in the northwestern county of Mis- 
souri, than within any other county in the state. Slav- 
ery pressed entirely up to the old western boundary of 
the state, and when rather recently a part of that boun- 
dary at the northwest was moved out a little farther 
west, slavery followed on quite up to the new line. 
Now when the restriction is removed, what is to prevent 
it from going still farther? Climate will not, no 
peculiarity of the country will, nothing in nature will. 
Will the disposition of the people prevent it? Those 
nearest the scene are all in favor of the extension. The 
Yankees who are opposed to it may be most numerous; 
but, in military phrase, the battlefield is too far from 
their base of operations. 

But it is said^ there now is no law in Nebraska on the 
subject of slavery, and that, in such case, taking a slave 
there operates his freedom. That is good book-law, but 
is not the rule of actual practice. Wherever slavery is, 
it has been first introduced without law. The oldest 
laws we find concerning it are not laws introducing it 
but regulating it as an already existing thing. A white 
man takes his slave to Nebraska now. Who will inform 
the negro that he is free? Who will take him before 
court to test the question of his freedom ? In ignorance 
of his legal emancipation he is kept chopping, splitting, 
and plowing. Others are brought, and move on in the 
same track. At last, if ever the time for voting comes 
on the question of slavery, the institution already, in 
fact, exists in the countrj^, and cannot well be removed. 
The fact of its presence, and the difficulty of its removal, 
will carry the vote in its favor. Keep it out until a 
vote is taken, and a vote in favor of it cannot be got in 
any population of forty thousand on earthy who have 
been drawn together by the ordinary motives of emigra- 
tion and settlement. To get slaves into the territory 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 103 

simultaneously with the whites in the incipient stages of 
settlement is the precise stake played for and won in 
this Nebraska measure. 

The question is asked us: "If slaves will go in not- 
withstanding the general principle of law liberates them, 
why would they not equally go in against positive statute 
law — go in even if the Missouri restriction were main- 
tained?" I answer, because it takes a much bolder 
man to venture in with his property in the latter case 
than in the former; because the positive congressional 
enactment is known to and respected by all, or nearly 
all, whereas the negative principle that no law is free 
law is not much known except among lawyers. We 
have some experience of this practical difference. In 
spite of the ordinance of '87, a few negroes were brought 
into Illinois, and held in a state of quasi-slavery, not 
enough, however, to carry a vote of the people in favor 
of the institution when they came to form a constitu- 
tion. But into the adjoining Missouri country, where 
there was no ordinance of '87 — was no restriction, they 
were carried ten times, nay a hundred times, as fast, 
and actually made a slave state. This is fact — naked 
fact. 

Another lullaby argument is that taking slaves to new 
countries does not increase their number, does not make 
anyone slave who would otherwise be free. There is 
some truth in this, and I am glad of it; but it is not 
wholly true. The African slave-trade is •not yet effectu- 
ally suppressed; and if we make a reasonable deduction 
for the white people among us who are foreigners and 
the descendants of foreigners arriving here since 1808, 
w^e shall find the increase of the black population out- 
running that of the white to an extent unaccountable, 
except by supposing that some of them too, have been 
coming from Africa. If this be so, the opening of new 
countries to the institution increases the demand for and. 
augments the price of slaves, and so does, in fact, make 



[04 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

slaves of freemen^, by causing them to be brought from 
Africa and sold into bondage. 

But however this may be, we know the opening of new 
countries to slavery tends to the perpetuation of the 
institution, and so does keep men in slavery who would 
otherwise be free. This result we do not feel like favor- 
ing, and we are under no fegal obligation to suppress our 
feelings in this respect. 

Equal justice to the South, it is said, requires us to 
consent to the extension of slavery to new countries. 
That is to say, inasmuch as you do not object to my 
taking my hog to Nebraska, therefore I must not object 
to your taking your slave. Now, I admit that this is 
perfectly logical, if there is no difference between hogs 
and negroes. But while you thus require me to deny 
the humanity of the negro, I wish to ask whether you of 
the South, yourselves, have ever been willing to do as 
much? It is kindly provided that of all those who 
come into the world, only a small percentage are natural 
tyrants. That percentage is no larger in the slave 
States than in the free. The great majority. South as 
well as North, have human sympathies, of which they 
can no more divest themselves than they can of their 
sensibility to physical pain. These sympathies in the 
bosoms of the Southern people manifest in many ways 
their sense of the wrong of slavery, and their conscious- 
ness that after all, there is humanity in the negro. If 
they deny this^ let me address them a few plain ques- 
tions. In 1820 you joined the North almost unanim- 
ously in declaring the African slave-trade piracy, and in 
annexing to it the punishment of death. Why did you 
do this? If you did not feel that it was wrong, why did 
you join in providing that men should be hung for it? 
The practice was no more than bringing wild negroes 
from Africa to such as would buy them. But you never 
thought of hanging men for catching and selling wild 
horses, wild buffaloes, or wild bears. 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 105 

Again, you have among you a sneaking individual of 
the class of native tyrants known as the slave-dealer. 
He watches your necessities, and crawls up to buy your 
slave at a speculating price. If you cannot help it, you 
sell to him ; but if you can help it, you drive him from 
your door. You despise him utterly; 3'ou do not recog- 
nize him as a friend, or even as an honest man. Your 
children must not play with his; they may roUic freely 
with the little negroes, but not with the slave-dealer's 
children. If you are obliged to deal with him, you try 
to get through the job without so much as touching him. 
It is common with you to join hands with the men you 
meet; but with the slave-dealer you avoid the ceremony 
— instinctively shrinking from the snaky contact. If he 
grows rich and retires from business, you still remember 
him, and still keep up the ban of non-intercourse upon 
him and his family. Now, why is this? You do not 
so treat the man who deals in cotton, corn, or tobacco. 

And yet again. There are in the United States 
and territories, including the District of Columbia, 
433,643 free blacks. At five hundred dollars per head, 
they are worth over two hundred millions of dollars. 
How comes this vast amount of property to be running 
about without owners ? We do riot see free horses or 
free cattle running at large. How is this? All these 
free blacks are the descendants of slaves, or have been 
slaves themselves ; and they would be slaves now but for 
something that has operated on their white owners, in- 
ducing them at vast pecuniary sacrifice to liberate them. 
What is that something? Is there any mistaking it? 
In all these cases it is your sense of justice and human 
sympathy continually telling you that the poor negro 
has some natural right to himself — that those who deny 
it and make mere merchandise of him deserve kickings, 
contempt, and death. 

And now why will you ask us to deny the humanity of 
the slave, and estimate him as only the equal of the hog? 



106 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Why ask us to do what you will not do yourselves? 
Why ask us to do for nothing what two hundred millions 
of dollars could not induce you to do? 

But one great argument in support of the repeal of the 
Missouri Compromise is still to come. That argument 
is "the sacred right of self-government." It seems our 
distinguished senator has found great difficulty in get- 
ting his antagonists, even in the Senate, to meet him 
fairly on this argument. Some poet has said — 

"Fools rush in where angels fear to tread." * 
At a hazard of being thought one of the fools of this 
quotation, I meet that argument — I rush in — I take 
that bull by the horns. I trust I understand and truly 
estimate the right of self-government. My faith in the 
proposition that each man should do precisely as he 
pleases with all which is exclusively his own lies at the 
foundation of the sense of justice there is in me. I ex- 
tend the principle to communities of men as well as to 
individuals. I so extend it because it is politically wise, 
as well as naturally just: politically wise in saving us 
from broils about matters which do not concern us. 
Here, or at Washington, I would not trouble myself with 
the oyster laws of Virginia, or the cranberry laws of 
Indiana. The doctrine of self-government is right — 
absolutely and eternally right — but it has no just appli- 
cation as here attempted. Or perhaps I should rather 
say that whether it has such application depends upon 
whether a negro is not or is a man. If he is not a man, 
in that case he who is a man may as a matter of self- 
government do just what he pleases with him. But if 
the negro is a man, is it not to that extent a total de- 
struction of self-government to say that he too shall not 
govern himself? When the white man governs himself, 
that is self-government; but when he governs himself 
and also governs another man, that is more than self- 
government — that is despotism. If the negro is a man, 

* Alexander Pope in Essay on Criticism. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN IQT 

why then my ancient faith teaches me that "all men are 
created equal/' and that there can be no moral right in 
connection with one man's making a slave of another. 

Judge Douglas frequently, with bitter irony and sar- 
casm, paraphrases our argument by saying: "The white 
people of Nebraska are good enough to govern them- 
selves, but they are not good enough to govern a few 
miserable negroes !" 

Well! I doubt not that the people of Nebraska are 
and will continue to be as good as the average of people 
elsewhere. I do not say the contrary. What I do say 
is that no man is good enough to govern another man 
without that other's consent. I say this is the leading 
principle, the sheet anchor of American republicanism. 
Our Declaration of Independence says: 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all 
men are created equal; that they are endowed by their 
Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among 
these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 
That to secure these rights, governments are instituted 
among men, deriving their just powers from the consent 
of the governed." 

I have quoted so much at this time merely to show 
that, according to our ancient faith, the just powers of 
governments are derived from the consent of the gov- 
erned. Now the relation of master and slave is pro 
tanto,^ a total violation of this principle. The master 
not only governs the slave without his consent, but he 
governs him by a set of rules altogether different from 
those which he prescribes for himself. Allow all the 
governed an equal voice in the government, and that, and 
that only, is self-government. 

Let it not be said I am contending for the establish- 
ment of political and social equality between the whites 
and blacks, I have already said the contrary. I am 

* By so much. 



108 SELECTIONS EROM LINCOLN 

not combating the argument of necessity, arising from 
the fact that the blacks are already among us ; but I am 
combating what is set up as moral argument for allow- 
ing them to be taken where they have never yet been — 
arguing against the extension of a bad things which, 
where it already exists^ we must of necessity manage as 
we best can. 

In supi^ort of his application of the doctrine of self- 
government^ Senator Douglas has sought to bring to his 
aid the opinions and examples of our Revolutionary 
fathers. I am glad he has done this. I love the senti- 
ments of those old-time men, and shall be most happy 
to abide by their opinions. He shows us that when it 
was in contemplation for the colonies to break oif from 
Great Britain, and set up a new government for them- 
selves, several of the states instructed their delegates to 
go for the measure, provided each state should be allowed 
to regulate its domestic concerns in its own way. I do 
not quote; but this in substance. This was right; I 
see nothing objectionable in it. I also think it probable 
that it had some reference to the existence of slavery 
among them. I will not deny that it had. But had it 
any reference to the carrying of slavery into new coun- 
tries? That is the question, and we will let the fathers 
themselves answer it. 

This same generation of men, and mostly the same 
individuals of the generation who declared this principle, 
who declared independence, who fought the War of the 
Revolution through, who afterward made the Constitu- 
tion under which we still live — these same men passed 
the Ordinance of '87, declaring thajt slavery should 
never go to the Northwest Territor3^ I have no doubt 
Judge Douglas thinks they were very inconsistent in 
this. It is a question of discrimination between them 
and him. But there is not an inch of ground left for his 
claiming that their opinions, their example, their author- 
ity, are on his side in the controversy. 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN IQD 

Again^ is not Nebraska^ while a territory, a part of 
us ? Do we not own the country ? And if we sur- 
render the control of it^ do we not surrender the right of 
self-government? It is part of ourselves. .If you say 
we shall not control it, because it is only part, the same 
is true of every other part; and when all the parts are 
gone, what has become of the whole? What is then 
left of us ? What use for the general government, when 
there is nothing left for it to govern? 

But you say this question should be left to the people 
of Nebraska, because they are more particularly in- 
terested. If this be the rule, you must leave it to each 
individual to say for himself whether he will have slaves. 
What better moral right have thirty-one citizens of 
Nebraska to say that the thirty-second shall not hold 
slaves than the people of the thirty-one states have to 
sav that slavery shall not go into the thirty-second state 
at* all? 

But if it is a sacred right for the people of Nebraska 
to take and hold slaves there, it is equally their sacred 
right to buy them where they can buy them cheapest; 
and that, undoubtedly, will be on the coast of Africa, 
provided you will consent not to hang them for going 
there to buy them. You must remove this restriction, 
too, from the sacred right of self-government. I am 
aware, you say, that taking slaves from the states to 
Nebraska does not make slaves of freemen ; but the 
African slave-trader can say just as much. He does 
not catch free negroes and bring them here. He finds 
them already slaves in the hands of their black captors, 
and he honestly buys them at the rate of a red cotton 
handkerchief a head. This is very cheap, and it is a 
great abridgment of the sacred right of self-government 
to hang men for engaging in this profitable trade. 

Another important obj ection to. this application of the 
right of self-government is that it enables the first few 
to deprive the succeeding many of a free exercise of the 



110 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

right of self-government. The first few may get slavery 
in, and the subsequent many cannot easily get it out. 
How common is the remark now in the slave states, "If 
we were only clear of our slaves, how much better it 
would be for us." They are actually deprived of the 
privilege of governing themselves as they would, by the 
action of a very few in the beginning. The same thing 
was true of the whole nation at the time our Constitution 
was formed. 

Whether slavery shall go into Nebraska, or other new 
territories, is not a matter of exclusive concern to the 
people who may go there. The whole nation is inter- 
ested that the best use shall be made of these territories. 
We want them for homes of free white people. This 
they cannot be, to any considerable extent, if slavery 
shall be planted within them. Slave states are places 
for poor white people to remove from, not to remove to. 
New free states are the places for poor people to go to, 
and better their condition. For this use the nation needs 
these territories. 

Still further: there are constitutional relations be- 
tween the slave and free states which are degrading to 
the latter. We are under legal obligations to catch and 
return their runaway slaves to them: a sort of dirty, 
disagreeable job, which, I believe^ as a general rule, the 
slaveholders will not perform for one another. Then 
again, in the control of the government — the manage- 
ment of the partnership aifairs — they have greatly the 
advantage of us. By the Constitution each state has 
two senators, each has a number of representatives in 
proportion to the number of its people, and each has a 
number of presidential electors equal to the whole num- 
ber of its senators and representatives together. But 
in ascertaining the number of the people for this pur- 
pose, five slaves were counted as being equal to three 
whites. The slaves do not vote; they are only counted, 
and so used to swell the influence of the white people's 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN m 

votes. The practical effect of this is more aptly shown 
by a comparison of the states of South Carolina and 
Maine. South Carolina has six representatives, and so has 
Maine; South Carolina has eight presidential electors, 
and so has Maine. This is precise equality so far; and, of 
course they are equal in senators, each having two. 
Thus in the control of the government the two states 
are equals precisely. But how are they in the number 
of their white people? Maine has 581,813, while South 
Carolina has 271,567; Maine has twice as many as 
South Carolina, and 32,679 over. Thus, each white man 
in South Carolina is more than the double of any man in 
Maine. This is all because South Carolina, besides her 
free people, has 38-1,984 slaves. The South Carolinian 
has precisely the same advantage over the white man in 
every other free state as well as in Maine. He is more 
than the double of any one of us in this crowd. The 
same advantage, but not to the same extent, is held by 
all the citizens of the slave states over those of the 
free; and it is an absolute truth, without an exception, 
that there is no voter in any slave state, but who has 
more legal power in the government than any voter in 
any free state. There is no instance of exact equality ; 
and the disadvantage is against us the whole chapter 
through. This principle, in the aggregate, gives the 
slave states in the present Congress twenty additional 
representatives, being seven more than the whole major- 
ity by which they passed the Nebraska Bill. 

Now all this is manifestly unfair; yet I do not men- 
tion it to complain of it, in so far as it is already settled. 
It is in the Constitution, and I do not for that cause, or 
any other cause, propose to destroy, or alter, or disre- 
gard the Constitution. I stand to it, fairly, fully, and 
firmly. 

But when I am told I must leave it altogether to other 
people to say whether new partners are to be bred up 
and brought into the firm, on the same degrading terms 



112 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

against me, I respectfully demur. I insist that whether 
I shall be a whole man, or only the half of one, in com- 
parison with others, is a question in which I am some- 
what concerned, and one which no other man can have a 
sacred right of deciding for me. If I am wrong in this 
— if it really be a sacred right of self-government in the 
man who shall go to Nebraska to decide whether he will 
be the equal of me or the double of me, then, after he 
shall have exercised that right, and thereby shall have 
reduced me to a still smaller fraction of a man than I 
already am, I should like for some gentleman, deeply 
skilled in the mysteries of sacred rights, to provide him- 
self with a microscope, and peep about, and find out, if 
he can, what has become of my sacred rights. They 
will surely be too small for detection with the naked 
eye. 

Finally, I insist that if there is anything which it is 
the duty of the whole people to never intrust to any 
hands but their own, that thing is the preservation and 
perpetuity of their own liberties and institutions. And 
if they shall think, as I do, that the extension of slavery 
endangers them more than any or all other causes, how 
recreant to themselves if they submit the question, and 
with it the fate of their country, to a mere handful of 
men bent only on self-interest. If this question of 
slavery extension were an insignificant one — one having 
no power to do harm — it might be shuffled aside in this 
way; and being, as it is, the grent Behemoth * of danger, 
shall the strong grip of the nation be loosened upon him, 
to intrust him to the hands of such feeble keepers ? 

I have done with this mighty argument of self-gov- 
ernment. Go, sacred thing! Go in peace. 

But Nebraska is urged as a great Union-saving 
measure. Well, I too go for saving the Union. Much 
as I hate slavery, I would consent to the extension of it 
rather than see the Union dissolved, just as I would 

• Job, xl, 15. 



SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 113 

consent to any great evil to avoid a greater one. But 
when I go to Union-saving, I must believe, at least, that 
the means I emplo}^ have some adaptation to the end. 
To my mind, Nebraska has no such adaptation. 
"It hath no relish of salvation in it.""^ 

It is an aggravation, rather, of the only one thing 
which ever endangers the Union. When it came upon 
us, all was peace and quiet. The nation was looking 
to the forming of new bonds of union, and a long course 
of peace and prosperity seemed to lie before us. In 
the whole range of possibility, there scarcely appears to 
me to have been anything out of which the slavery agita- 
tion could have been revived, except the very project of 
repealing the Missouri Compromise. Every inch of ter- 
ritory we owned already had a definite settlement of the 
slavery question, by which all parties were pledged to 
abide. Indeed, there was no uninhabited country on the 
continent which we could acquire, if we except some 
extreme northern regions which are wholly out of the 
question. 

In this state of affairs the Genius of Discord himself 
could scarcely have invented a way of again setting us 
by the ears but by turning back and destroying the peace 
measures of the past. The counsels of that Genius seem 
to have prevailed. The Missouri Compromise was re- 
pealed; and here we are in the midst of a new slavery 
agitation, such, I think, as we have never seen before. 
Who is responsible for this.^ Is it those who resist the 
measure, or those who causelessly brought it forward 
and pressed it through, having reason to know, and in 
fact knowing, it must and would be resisted? It could 
not but be expected by its author that it would be looked 
upon as a measure for the extension of slavery, aggra- 
vated by a gross breach of faith. 

Argue as you will and long as you will, this is the 
naked front and aspect of the measure. And in this 

* Hamlet, Act III, Scene iii. Not an exact quotation. 



114 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

aspect it coulH not but produce agitation. Slavery is 
founded in the selfishness of man's nature — opposition 
to it in his love of justice. These principles are an 
eternal antagonism, and when brought into collision so 
fiercely as slavery extension brings them, shocks and 
throes and convulsions must ceaselessly follow. Repeal 
the Missouri Compromise, repeal all compromises, repeal 
the Declaration of Independence, repeal all past history, 
you still cannot repeal human nature. It still will be 
the abundance of man's heart that slavery extension is 
wrong, and out of the abundance of his heart his mouth 
will continue to speak.- 

The structure, too, of the Nebraska bill is very pe- 
culiar. The people are to decide the question of slavery 
for themselves ; but when they are to decide or how 
they are to decide, or whether, when the question is once 
decided, it is to remain so or is to be subject to an in- 
definite succession of new trials, the law does not say. 
Is it to be decided by the first dozen settlers who arrive 
there, or is it to await the arrival of a hundred? Is it to 
be decided by a vote of the people or a vote of the legis- 
lature, or indeed, by a vote of any sort.^ To these ques- 
tions the law gives no answer. There is a mystery 
about this; for when a member proposed to give the 
legislature express authority to exclude slavery, it was 
hooted down by the friends of the bill. This fact is 
worth remembering. Some Yankees in the East are 
sending emigrants to Nebraska to exclude slavery from 
it; and, so far as t can judge, they expect the question 
to be decided by voting in some way or other. But the 
Missourians are awake, too. They are within a stone's 
throw of the contested ground. They hold meetings and 
pass resolutions, in which not the slightest allusion to 
voting is made. They resolve that slavery already 
exists in the territory; that more shall go there; that 
they, remaining in Missouri, will protect it, and that 

* See Matthew, xii, 34 ; Luke,' vi, 45. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN II5 

Abolitionists shall be hung or driven away. Through 
all this bowie-knives and six-shooters are seen plainly 
enough, but never a glimpse of the ballot-box. 

And really, what is the result of all this.'' Each party 
within having numerous and determined backers without, 
is it not probable that the contest will come to blows 
and bloodshed.^ Could there be a more apt invention to 
bring about collision and violence on the slavery ques- 
tion than this Nebraska project is.'* I do not charge or 
believe that such was intended by Congress; but if 
they had literally formed a ring and placed champions 
within it to fight out the controversy, the fight could be 
no more likely to come off than it is. And if this fight 
should begin, is it likely to take a very peaceful, Union- 
saving turn-f^ Will not the first drop of blood so shed 
be the real knell of the Union.'* 

The Missouri Compromise ought to be restored. For 
the sake of the Union, it ought to be restored. We ought 
to elect a House of Representatives which will vote its 
restoration. If by any means we omit to do this, what 
follows.^ Slavery may or may not be established in 
Nebraska. But whether it be or not, we shall have 
repudiated — discarded from the councils of the nation — 
the spirit of compromise; for who, after this, will ever 
trust in a national compromise? The spirit of mutual 
concession — that spirit which first gave us the Constitu- 
tion, and which has thrice saved the Union — we shall 
have strangled and cast from us forever. And what 
shall we have in lieu of it? The South, flushed with 
triumph and tempted to excess; the North, betrayed as 
the}^ believe, brooding on wrong and burning for revenge. 
One side will provoke, the other resent. The one will 
taunt, the other defy ; one aggresses, the other retaliates. 
Already a few in the North defy all constitutional re- 
straints, resist the execution of the fugitive-slave law, 
and even menace the institution of slavery in the states 
where it exists. Already a few in the South claim the 



116 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

constitutional right to take and to hold slaves in the free 
states — demand the revival of the slave-trade — and de- 
mand a treaty with Great Britain by which fugitive 
slaves may be reclaimed from Canada. As yet they 
are but few on either side. It is a grave question for 
lovers of the Union, whether the final destruction of the 
Missouri Compromise, and with it the spirit of all com- 
promise, will or will not embolden and embitter each of 
these, and fatally increase the number of both. 

But restore the compromise, and what then? We 
thereby restore the national faith, the national con- 
fidence, the national feeling of brotherhood. We thereby 
reinstate the spirit of concession and compromise, that 
spirit which has never failed us in past perils, and 
which may be safely trusted for all the future. The 
South ought to join in doing this. The peace of the 
nation is as dear to them as to us. In memories of the 
past and hopes of the future, they share as largely as 
we. It would be on their part a great act — great in its 
spirit, and great in its effect. It would be worth to the 
nation a hundred years' purchase of peace and prosper- 
ity. And what of sacrifice would they make? They 
only surrender to us what they gave us for a considera- 
tion long, long ago; what they have not now asked for, 
struggled or cared for; what has been thrust upon them 
not less to their astonishment than to ours. 

But it is said we cannot restore it; that though we 
elect every member of the lower House, the Senate is 
still against us. It is quite true that of the senators who 
passed the Nebraska bill, a majorit}?- of the whole Senate 
will retain their seats in spite of the elections of this 
and the next year. But if at these elections their sev- 
eral constituencies shall clearly express their will against 
Nebraska, will these Senators disregard their will? 
Will they neither obey nor make room for those who 
will? 

But even if we fail to technicallv restore the com- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 117 

promise, it is still a great point to carry a popular vote 
in favor of the restoration. The moral weight of such a 
vote cannot be estimated too highly. The authors of 
Nebraska are not at all satisfied with the destruction 
of the compromise — an indorsement of this principle they 
proclaim to be the great object. With them, Nebraska 
alone is a small matter — to establish a principle for 
future use is what they particularly desire. 

The future use is to be the planting of slavery wher- 
ever in the wide world local and unorganized opposition 
cannot prevent it. Now, if you wish to give them this 
indorsement, if you wish to establish this principle, do 
so. I shall regret it, but it is your right. On the con- 
trary, if you are opposed to the principle — intend to 
give it no such indorsement — let no wheedling, no 
sophistry, divert you from throwing a direct vote against 
it. 

Some men, mostly Whigs, who condemn the repeal of 
the Missouri Compromise, nevertheless hesitate to go for 
its restoration, lest they be thrown in company with the 
Abolitionists. Will they allow, me, as an old Whig, to 
tell them, good-humoredly, that I think this is very silly ? 
Stand with anybody that stands right. Stand with him 
while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong. 
Stand with the Abolitionist in restoring the Missouri 
Compromise, and stand against him when he attempts to 
repeal the fugitive-slave law. In the latter case yon 
stand with the Southern disunionist. What of that? 
You are still right. In both cases you are right. In 
both cases you expose the dangerous extremes. In both 
you stand on middle ground, and hold the ship level and 
steady. In both you are national, and nothing less than 
national. This is the good old Whig ground. To desert 
such ground because of any company, is to be less than 
a Whig — less than a man — less than an American. 

I particularly object to the new position which the 
avowed principle of this Nebraska law gives to slavery 



118 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

in the body politic. I object to it because it assumes 
that there can be moral right in the enslaving of one 
man by another. I object to it as a dangerous dalliance 
for a free people — a sad evidence that, feeling pros- 
perity, we forget right; that liberty, as a principle, we 
have ceased to revere. I object to it because the fathers 
of the republic eschewed and rej ected it. The argument 
of "necessity" was the only argument they ever admitted 
in favor of slavery; and so far, and so far only, as it 
carried them did it ever go. They found the institution 
existing among us, wliich they could not help, and they 
cast blame upon the British king for having permitted 
its introduction. Before the Constitution they prohibited 
its introduction into the Northwestern Territory, the 
only country we owned then free from it. At the fram- 
ing and adoption of the Constitution, they forbore to so 
much as mention the word "slave" or "slavery" in the 
whole instrument. In the provision for the recovery of 
fugitives, the slave is spoken of as a "person held in 
service or labor." In that prohibiting the abolition of 
the African slave-trade for twenty years, that trade is 
spoken of as "the migration or importation of such per- 
sons as any of the states now existing shall think proper 
to admit," etc. These are the only provisions alluding 
to slavery. Thus the thing is hid away in the Constitu- 
tion, just as an afflicted man hides away a wen or cancer 
which he dares not cut out at once, lest he bleed to death 
— with the promise, nevertheless, that the cutting may 
begin at a certain time. Less than this our fathers could 
not do, and more they would not do. Necessity drove 
them so far, and further they would not go. But this 
is not all. The earliest Congress under the Constitution 
took the same view of slavery. They hedged and 
hemmed it in to the narrowest limits of necessity. 

In 1794 they prohibited an outgoing slave-trade — that 
is the taking of slaves from the United States to sell. 
In 1798 they prohibited the bringing of slaves from 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 119 

Africa into the Mississippi Territory, this territory then 
comprising what are now the states of Mississippi and 
Alabama. This was ten years before they had the 
authority to do the same thing as to the states existing 
at the adoption of the Constitution. In 1800 they pro- 
hibited American citizens from trading in slaves between 
foreign countries, as, for instance, from Africa to Brazil. 
In 1803 they passed a law in aid of one or two slave- 
state laws, in restraint of the internal slave-trade. In 
1807, in apparent hot haste, they passed the law, nearly 
a year in advance — to take effect the first day of 1808, 
the very first day the Constitution would permit — pro- 
hibiting the African slave-trade by heavy pecuniary and 
corporal penalties. In 1820, finding these provisions in- 
effectual, they declared the slave-trade piracy, and 
affixed to it the extreme penalty of death. While all this 
was passing in the General Government, five or six of 
the original slave states had adopted systems? of gradual 
emancipation, by which the institution was rapidly be- 
coming extinct within their limits. Thus we see that 
the plain, unmistakable spirit of that age toward slavery 
was hostility to the principle and toleration only by 
necessity. 

But now it is to be transformed into a "sacred right." 
Nebraska brings it forth, places it on the highroad to 
extension and perpetuity, and with a pat on its back says 
to it, "Go, and God speed you." Henceforth it is to be 
the chief jewel of the nation — the very figurehead of 
the Ship of State. Little by little, but steadily as man's 
march to the grave, we have been giving up the old for 
the new faith. Near eighty years ago we began by 
declaring that all men are created equal; but now from 
that beginning we have run down to the other declara- 
tion, that for some men to enslave others is a "sacred 
right of self-government." These principles cannot 
stand together. They are as opposite as God and 
Mammon; and whoever holds to the one must despise 



120 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

the other. When Pettit,* in connection with his support 
of the Nebraska bill, called the Declaration of , Inde- 
pendence "a self-evident lie," he only did what con- 
sistency and candor require all other Nebraska men to 
do. Of the forty-odd Nebraska senators who sat present 
and heard him, no one rebuked him. Nor am I apprised 
that any Nebraska newspaper, or any Nebraska orator, 
in the whole nation has ever yet rebuked him. If this 
had been said among Marion's men, Southerners though 
they were, what would have become of the man who 
said it? If this had been said to the men who captured 
Andre, the man who said it would probably have been 
hung sooner than Andre was. If it had been said in old 
Independence Hall seventy-eight years ago, the very 
doorkeeper would have throttled the man and thrust him 
into the street. Let no one be deceived. The spirit of 
seventy-six and the spirit of Nebraska are utter an- 
tagonisms; and the former is being rapidly displaced by 
the latter. 

Fellow-countrymen, Americans, South as well as 
North, shall we make no effort to arrest this? Already 
the liberal party throughout the world express the appre- 
hension "that the one retrograde institution in America 
is undermining the principles of progress, and fatally 
violating the noblest political system the world ever 
saw." This is not the taunt of enemies, but the warning 
of friends. Is it quite safe to disregard it — to despise 
it? Is there no danger to liberty itself in discarding the 
earliest practice and first precept of our ancient faith? 
In our greedy chase to make profit of the negro, let us 
beware lest we "cancel and tear in pieces" even the 
white man's charter of freedom. 

Our republican robe is soiled and trailed in the dust. 
Let us re-purify it. Let us turn and wash it white in the 
spirit, if not the blood, of the Revolution. Let us turn 
slavery from its claims of "moral right" back upon its 

* John Pettit, senator from Tndinna. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 121 

existing legal rights and its arguments of "necessity." 
Let us return it to the position our fathers gave it, and 
there let it rest in peace. Let us readopt the Declaration 
of Independence, and with it the practices and policy 
which harmonize with it. Let North and South — let all 
Americans— let all lovers of liberty everywhere join in 
the great and good work. If we do this, we shall not 
only have saved the Union, but we shall have so saved it 
as to make and to keep it forever worthy of the saving. 
We shall have so saved it that the succeeding millions 
of free, happy people, the world over, shall rise up and 
call us blessed to the latest generations. 

At Springfield, twelve days ago, where I had spoken 
substantially as I have here. Judge Douglas replied to 
me; and as he is to reply to me here, I shall attempt to 
anticipate him by noticing some of the points he made 
there. He commenced by stating I had assumed all the 
way through that the principle of the Nebraska bill 
would have the effect of extending slavery. He denied 
that this was intended, or that this effect would follow. 

I will not reopen the argument upon this point. That 
such was the intention the world believed at the start, 
and will continue to believe. This was the countenance 
of the thing, and both friends and enemies instantly 
recognized it as such. That countenance cannot now be 
changed by argument. You can as easily argue the color 
out of the negro's skin. Like the "bloody hand," * 
though you may wash it and wash it, the red witness of 
guilt still sticks and stares horribly at you. 

Next he says that congressional intervention never 
prevented slavery anywhere; that it did not prevent it 
in the Northwestern Territory, nor in Illinois; that, in 
fact, Illinois came into the Union as a slave state; that 
the principle of the Nebraska bill expelled it from Illi- 
nois, from several old states, from everywhere. 

Now this is mere quibbling all the way through. If 

* Macbeth, Act II, Scene ii. 



122 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN | 

the ordinance of '87 did not keep slavery out of the 
Northwest Territory^ how happens it that the north- 
west shore of the Ohio River is entirely free from it, 
while the southeast shore, less than a mile distant, along 
nearly the whole length of the river, is entirely covered 
with it? 

If that ordinance did not keep it out of Illinois, what 
was it that made the difference between Illinois and 
Missouri? They lie side by side, the Mississippi River 
only dividing them, while their early settlements were 
within the same latitude. Between 1810 and 1820, the 
number of slaves in Missouri increased 7,211, while in 
Illinois, in the same ten years they decreased 51. This 
apjaears by the census returns. During nearly all of 
that ten years both were territories, not states. During 
this time the ordinance forbade slavery to go into Illi- 
nois, and nothing forbade it to go into Missouri. It did 
go into Missouri, and did not go into Illinois. That is 
the fact. Can anyone doubt as to the reason of it? But 
he says Illinois came into the Union as a slave state. 
Silence, perhaps, would be the best answer to this flat 
contradiction of the known history of the country. What 
are the facts upon which this bold assertion is based? 
When we first acquired the country, as far back as 1787, 
there were some slaves within it held by the French in- 
habitants of Kaskaskia. The territorial legislation ad- 
mitted a few negroes from the slave states as indentured 
servants. One year after the adoption of the first state 
constitution, the whole number of them was — what do 
you think? Just one hundred and seventeen, while the 
aggregate free population was 55,094 — about four hun- 
dred and seventy to one. Upon this state of facts the 
people framed their constitution prohibiting the further 
introduction of slavery, with a sort of guarantee to the 
owners of the few indentured servants, giving freedom 
to their children to be born thereafter, and making no 
mention whatever of any supposed slave for life. Out 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 123 

of this small matter the Judge manufactures his argu- 
ment that Illinois came into the Union as a slave state. 
Let the facts be the answer to the argument. 

The principles of the Nebraska bill, he says, expelled 
slavery from Illinois. The principle of that bill first 
planted it here — that is, it first came because there was 
no law to prevent it, first came before we owned the 
country ; and finding it here, and having the ordinance 
of '87 to prevent its increasing, our people struggled 
along, and finally got rid of it as best they could. 
• But the principle of the Nebraska bill abolished 
slavery in several of the old states. Well, it is true that 
several of the old states, in the last quarter of the last 
century, did adopt systems of gradual emancipation by 
which the institution has finally become extinct within 
their limits; but it may or may not be true that the 
principle of the Nebraska bill was the cause that led to 
the adoption of these measures. It is now more than 
fifty years since the last of these states adopted its 
system of emancipation. 

If the Nebraska bill is the real author of these 
benevolent works, it is rather deporable that it has for 
so long a time ceased working altogether. Is there not 
some reason to suspect that it was the principle of the 
Revolution, and not the principle of the Nebraska bill, 
that led to emancipation in these old states? Leave it 
to the people of these old emancipating states, and I 
am quite certain they will decide that neither that nor 
any other good thing ever did or ever will come of the 
Nebraska bill. 

In the course of my main argument. Judge Douglas 
interrupted me to say that the principle of the Nebraska 
bill was very old; that it originated when God made 
man, and placed good and evil before him, allowing him 
to choose for himself, being responsible for the choice 
he should make. At the time I thought this was merely 
playful, and I answered it accordingly. But in his reply 



124 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

to me he renewed it as a serious argument. In serious- 
ness, then^ the facts of this proposition are not true as 
stated. God did not place good and evil before man, 
telling him to make his choice. On the contrary, he did 
tell him there was one tree of the fruit of which he 
should not eat, upon pain of certain death. I should 
scarcely wish so strong a prohibition against slavery in 
Nebraska. 

But this argument strikes me as not a little remark- 
able in another particular — in its strong resemblance 
to the old argument for the "divine right of kings." By 
the latter, the king is to do just as he pleases with his 
white subjects, being responsible to God alone. By the 
former, the white man is to do just as he pleases with 
his black slaves, being responsible to God alone. 
The two things are precisely alike, and it is but natu- 
ral that they should find similar arguments to sustain 
them. 

I had argued that the application of the principle of 
self-government, as contended for, would require the 
revival of the African slave-trade ; that no argument 
could be made in favor of a man's right to take slaves to 
Nebraska which could not be equally well made in favor 
of his right to bring them from the coast of Africa. The 
Judge replied that the Constitution requires the sup- 
pression of the foreign slave-trade, but does not require 
the prohibition of slavery in the territories. That is a 
mistake in point of fact. The Constitution does not 
require the action of Congress in either case, and it does 
authorize it in both. And so there is still no diiference 
between the cases. 

In regard to what I have said of the advantage the 
slave states have over the free in the matter of represen- 
tation, the Judge replied that we in the free states count 
five free negroes as five white people, while in the slave 
states they count five slaves three whites only, and that 
the advantage, at last, was on the side of the free states. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 125 

Now, in the slave states they count free negroes just 
as we do; and it so happens that, besides their slaves, 
they have as many free negroes as we have, and thirty 
thousand over. Thus, their free negroes more than bal- 
ance ours; and their advantage over us, in consequence 
of their slaves, still remains as I stated it. 

In reply to my argument that the compromise measures 
of 1850 were a system of equivalents, and that the pro- 
visions of no one of them could fairly be carried to other 
subjects, without its corresponding equivalent being 
carried with it, the Judge denied outright that these 
measures had any connection with or dependence upon 
each other. This is mere desperation. If they had no 
connection, why are they always spoken of in connection ? 
Why has he so spoken of them a thousand times ? Why 
has he constantly called them a series of measures? 
W^hy does everybody call them a compromise ? Why was 
California kept out of the Union six or seven months, 
if it was not because of its connection with the other 
measures.^ Webster's leading definition of the verb "to 
compromise" is "to adjust and settle a difference, by 
mutual agreement, with concessions of claims by the 
parties." This conveys precisely the popular under- 
standing of the word "compromise." 

We knew, before the Judge told us, that these measures 
passed separately, and in distinct bills, and that no two 
of them were passed by the votes of precisely the same 
members. But we also know, and so does he know, that 
no one of them could have passed both branches of Con- 
gress but for the understanding that the others were to 
pass also. Upon this understanding, each got votes 
which it could have got in no other way. It is this fact 
which gives to the measures their true character; and 
it is the universal knowledge of this fact that has given 
tliem the name of "compromises," so expressive of that 
true character. 

I had asked "if, in carrying the Utah and New Mexico 



126 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

laws to Nebraska, you could clear away other objection, 
how could you leave Nebraska 'perfectly free' to intro- 
duce slavery before she forms a constitution during her 
territorial government, while the Utah and New Mexico 
laws only authorize it when they form constitutions and 
are admitted into the Union?" To this Judge Douglas 
answered that the Utah and New Mexico laws also 
authorized it before ; and to prove this he read from one 
of their laws, as follows : "That the legislative power 
of said territory shall extend to all rightful subjects of 
legislation, consistent with the Constitution of the United 
States and the provisions of this act." 

Now it is perceived from the reading of this that there 
is nothing express upon the subject, but that the 
authority is sought to be implied merely for the general 
provision of "all rightful subjects of legislation." In 
reply to this I insist, as a legal rule of construction, as 
well as the plain, popular view of the matter, that the 
express provision for Utah and New Mexico coming in 
with slavery, if they choose, when they shall form Con- 
stitutions, is an exclusion of all implied authority on 
the same subject; that Congress, having the subject dis- 
tinctly in their minds when they made the express pro- 
vision, they therein expressed their whole meaning on 
that subject. 

The Judge rather insinuated that I had found it con- 
venient to forget the Washington territorial law passed 
in 1853. This was a division of Oregon organizing the 
northern part as the Territory of Washington. He 
asserted that by this act the ordinance of '87, theretofore 
existing in Oregon, was repealed; that nearly all the 
members of Congress voted for it, beginning in the House 
of Representatives with Charles Allen of Massachusetts, 
and ending with Richard Yates of Illinois; and that he 
could not understand how those who now oppose the 
Nebraska bill so voted there, unless it was because it 
was then too soon after both the great political parties 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 127 

had ratified the compromises of 1850, and the ratification 
therefore was too fresh to be then repudiated. 

Now I have seen the Washington act before, and I 
have carefully examined it since; and I aver that there 
is no repeal of the ordinance of '87, or of any prohibition 
of slavery, in it. In express terms, there is absolutely 
nothing in the whole law upon the subject — in fact, 
nothing to lead a reader to think of the subject. To my 
judgment it is equally free from everything from which 
repeal can be legally implied; but however this may be, 
are men now to be entrapped by a legal implication, 
extracted from covert language, introduced perhaps for 
the very purpose of entrapping them? I sincerely wish 
every man could read this law quite through, carefully 
watching every sentence and every line for a repeal of 
the ordinance of '87, or anything equivalent to it. 

Another point on the Washington act. If it was in- 
tended to be modeled after the Utah and New Mexico 
acts, as Judge Douglas insists, why was it not inserted 
in it, as in them, that Washington was to come in with 
or without slavery as she may choose at the adoption 
of her constitution? It has no such provision in it; and 
I defy the ingenuity of man to give a reason for the 
omission, other than that it was not intended to follow 
the Utah and New Mexico laws in regard to the question 
of slavery. 

The Washington act not only differs vitally from the 
Utah and New Mexico acts, but the Nebraska act differs 
vitally from both. By the later act the people are left 
"perfectly free" to regulate their own domestic concerns, 
etc. ; but in all the former, all their laws are to be sub- 
mitted to Congress, and if disapproved are to be null. 
The Washington act goes even further; it absolutely 
prohibits the territorial legislature, by verjr strong and 
guarded language, from establishing banks or borrowing 
money on the faith of the territory. Is this the sacred 
right of self-government we hear vaunted so much? No, 



128 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

sir; the Nebraska bill finds no model in the acts of '50 
or the Washington act. It finds no model in any law 
from Adam till today. As Phillips says of Napoleon, 
the Nebraska act is "grand, gloomy, and peculiar, 
wrapped in the solitude of its own originality, without a 
model and without a shadow upon the earth." 

In the course of his reply Senator Douglas remarked 
in substance that he had always considered this govern- 
ment was made for the white people and not for the 
negroes. Why, in point of mere fact, I, think so too. 
But in this remark of the Judge there is a significance 
which I think is the key to the great mistake (if there 
is any such mistake) which he has made in this Nebraska 
measure. It shows that the Judge has no very vivid im- 
pression that the negro is human, and consequently has 
no idea that there can be any moral question in legislat- 
ing about him. In his view the question of whether a 
new country shall be slave or free, is a matter of as utter 
indifference as it is whether his neighbor shall plant his 
farm with tobacco or stock it with horned cattle. Now, 
whether this view is right or wrong, it is very certain that 
the great mass of mankind take a totally different view. 
They consider slavery a great moral wrong, and their 
feeling against it is not evanescent, but eternal. It lies 
at the very foundation of their sense of justice, and it 
cannot be trifled with. It is a great and durable element 
of popular action, and I think no statesman can safely 
disregard it. 

Our senator also objects that those who oppose him in 
this matter do not entirely agree with one another. He 
reminds me that in my firm adherence to the consti- 
tutional rights of the slave states, I differ widely from 
others who are cooperating with me in opposing the 
Nebraska bill, and he says it is not quite fair to oppose 
him in this variety of ways. He should remember that 
he took us by surprise — astounded us by this measure. 
We were thunderstruck and stunned, and we reeled and 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 129 

fell in utter confusion. But we rose, each fighting, 
grasping whatever he could first reach — a scythe, a 
pitchfork, a chopping-ax, or a butcher's cleaver. We 
struck in the direction of the sound, and v/e were rapidly 
closing in upon him. He must not think to divert us 
from our purpose by showing us that our drill, our dress, 
and our weapons are not entirely perfect and uniform. 
When the storm shall be past he shall find us still Ameri- 
cans, no less devoted to the continued union and pros- 
perity of the country than heretofore. 

Finally, the Judge invokes against me the memory of 
Clay and Webster. They were great men, and men of 
great deeds. But where have I assailed them? For 
what is it that their lifelong enemy shall now make 
profit by assuming to defend them against me, their life- 
long friend? I go against the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise; did they ever go for it? They went for the 
compromises of 1850; did I ever go against them? They 
were greatly devoted to the Union ; to the small measure 
of my ability was I ever less so ? Clay and Webster 
were dead before this question arose ; by what authority 
shall our senator say they would espouse his side of it 
if alive? Mr. Clay was the leading spirit in making the 
Missouri Compromise ; is it very credible that if now 
alive he would take the lead in the breaking of it ? The 
truth is that some support from Whigs is now a necessity 
with the Judge, and for this it is that the names of Clay 
and Webster are invoked. His old friends have deserted 
him in such numbers as to leave too fevr^ to live by. He 
came to his own, and his own received him not; and lo ! 
he turns unto the Gentiles. 

A word now as to the Judge's desperate assumption 
that the compromises of 1850 had no connection with 
one another ; that Illinois came into the Union as a slave 
state, and some other similar ones. This is no other than 
a bold denial of the history of the country. If we do 
not know that the compromises of 1850 were dependent 



130 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

on each other; if we do not know that Illinois came into 
the Union as a free state — we do not know anything. 
If we do not know these things, we do not know that 
we ever had a Revolutionary war or such a chief as 
Washington. To deny these things is to deny our na- 
tional axioms — or dogmas, at least — and it puts an end 
to all argument. If a man will stand up and assert, and 
repeat and reassert, that two and two do not make four, 
I know nothing in the power of argument that can 
stop him. I think I can answer the Judge so long as he 
sticks to the premises ; but when he flies from them, I 
cannot work any argument into the consistency of a 
mental gag and actually close his mouth with it. In such 
a case I can only commend him to the seventy thousand 
answers just in from Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana.* 

After the Peoria speech Lincoln and Douglas came to an 
agreement not to continue the debate. The legislative elections 
resulted in a defeat for the Douglas adherents, who were in 
a minority. The majority was composed of Anti-Nebraska 
Democrats, Free-soilers, and Whigs, the last far outnumber- 
ing the others. Of this element Lincoln became the chosen 
candidate for the United States Senate and was compelled 
under the state law to resign from the legislature. He was 
certain of the Whigs and Free-soilers, but five Anti-Nebraska 
Democrats refused to vote for any Whig, and supported Ly- 
man Trumbull. After nine ballots, Lincoln, in order to secure 
the election of an opponent of the Kansas-Nebraska act, with- 
drew in favor of Trumbull, who was elected. 

All through the West the Anti-Nebraska men were organiz- 
ing under various names. It soon developed that Republican 
was a favorite name, due to the fact that they claimed to be 
the followers of Thomas Jefferson, the founder of the original 
Republican party and formulator of its principles. A Repub- 
lican state organization was perfected at Springfield in the 
autumn of 1854 and Lincoln was, without his knowledge, placed 
on the executive committee. He was not yet certain of where 

* These three states were all carried in the elections by Anti- 
Nebraska candidates. The allusion is to their combined 
majorities. 



SELECTIONS FROM IJXCOLN 13I 

he stood politically. Was the Whig: party dead? It seemed so, 
but there was no certainty of the fact. He suspected the 
Republicans of abolitionist sympathies and tendencies and knew 
that if this were true he did not belong in their fold. Even if it 
were not, it was uncertain if they would gain sufficient strength 
to accomplish anything. He therefore wrote this letter: 

TO I. codding' 

Springfield, November 27, 1854 
I. Codding, Esq. 

Dear Sir: Your note of the 13th requesting my 
attendance at the Republican State Central Committee, 
on the 17th instant at Chicago, was, owing to my absence 
from home, received on the evening of that day (17tb) 
only. While I have pen in hand allow me to say I have 
been perplexed some to understand why my name was 
placed on that committee. I was not consulted on the 
subject, nor was I apprised of the appointment until I 
discovered it by accident two or three weeks afterward. 
I suppose my opposition to the principle of slavery is as. 
strong as that of any member of the Republican party; 
but I have also supposed that the extent to which I feel 
authorized to carry that opposition, practically, was not 
at all satisfactory to that party. The leading men who 
organized that party were present on the 4th of October 
at the discussion between Douglas and myself at Spring- 
field, and had full opportunity to not misunderstand mv 
position. Do I misunderstand them? Please write and 
inform me. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In the meantime he was reaching a more fixed opinion in 
respect to the significance of the slavery question. Soon after 
the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act he and Judge T. Eyie 
Dickey were on circuit together, sharing the same room. After 
an evening spent in discussing the question with others they 
went to their room and after undressing continued to argue 



132 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

for some time. When Judge Dickey woke up, early the next 
morning, Lincoln was sitting up in bed and said, "Dickey, L tell 
you this nation cannot exist half slave and half free." He 
considered the idea further and in the following letter it is 
again expressed. George Robertson, to \vhom it is addressed, 
was a professor of law in Transylvania University who had 
been a member of Congress and Chief Justice of Kentucky. 

TO GEORGE ROBERTSON 

Springfield, IlL, August 15, 185.; 
Hon. George Robertson, Lexington, Kentucky. 

My dear Sir: The volume you left for me has been 
received. I am really grateful for the honor of your 
kind remembrance, as well as for the book. The partial 
reading I have already given it has afforded me much 
of both pleasure and instruction. It was new to me that 
the exact question which led to the Missouri Compromise 
had arisen before it arose in regard to Missouri, and that 
you had taken so prominent a part in it. Your short 
but able and patriotic speech upon that occasion has not 
been improved upon since by those holding the same 
views, and with all the lights you then had, the views 
you took appear to me as very reasonable. 

You are not a friend of slavery in the abstract. In 
that speech you spoke of "the peaceful extinction of 
slavery" and used other expressions indicating your 
belief that the thing was, at some time, to have an end. 
Since then we have had thirty-six years of experience; 
and this experience has demonstrated, I think, that there 
is no peaceful extinction of slavery in prospect for us. 
The signal failure of Henry Clay and other good and 
great men, in 1849, to effect anything in favor of gradual 
emancipation in Kentucky, together with a thousand 
other signs, extinguished that hope utterly. On the 
question of libert}^, as a principle, we nre not what we 
have been. When we were the political slaves of King 
George, and wanted to be free, we called the maxim that 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 133 

"all men are created equal" a self-evident truth^ but now 
when we have grown fat, and have lost all dread of 
being slaves ourselves, we have become so greedy to be 
masters that we call the same maxim "a self-evident lie." 
The Fourth of July has not quite dwindled away; it is 
still a great day — for burning fire-crackers ! 

That spirit which desired the peaceful extinction of 
slavery has itself become extinct with the occasion and 
the men of the Revolution. Under the impulse of that 
occasion, nearly half the states adopted systems of 
emancipation at once, and it is a significant fact that 
not a single state has done the like since. So far as 
peaceful, voluntary emancipation is concerned, the con- 
dition of the negro slave in America, scarcely less terrible 
to the contemplation of a free mind, is now as fixed and 
hopeless of change for the better as that of the lost souls 
of the finally impenitent. The Autocrat of all the 
Russias will resign his crown and proclaim his subjects 
free Republicans,* sooner than will our American 
masters voluntarily give up their slaves. 

Our political problem now is, "Can we as a nation 
continue together permanently — forever — half slave, and 
half free.^" The problem is too mighty for me — may 
God in his mercy superintend the solution. 

Your much obliged friend, and humble servant, 

A. Lincoln 

Lincoln's moderation at this time, as seen in his frank 
expression of belief in the necessity of protecting slave prop- 
erty where it existed, made him very unpopular with the 
Abolitionists who called him, "The Slave Hound of Illinois.' 
On the other hand the Illinois Whigs were afraid of his agita- 
tion against the Kansas-Nebraska act. His friend, Joshua 
Speed, wrote him, asking where he stood, and received this 
reply: 

♦ The Czar of Russia proclaimed the emancipation of the serfs 
the day before Lincoln was inaugurated President of the United 
States. 



134 SZLECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO JOSHUA F. SPEED 

Springfield, August 21-, 1855 
Dear Speed : You know what a poor correspondent 
I am. Ever since I received your very agreeable letter 
of the 22d of May I have been intending to write you 
an answer to it. You suggest that in political action 
now, you and I would differ. I suppose we would; not 
quite as much, however, as you may think. You know 
I dislike slavery, and you fully admit the abstract wrong 
of it. So far there is no cause of difference. But you 
say that sooner than yield your legal right to the slave, 
especially at the bidding of those who are not themselves 
interested, you would see the Union dissolved. I am 
not aware that anyone is bidding you yield that right; 
very certainly I am not. I leave that matter entirely 
to yourself. I also acknowledge your rights and my obli- 
gations under the Constitution in regard to your slaves. 
I confess I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down 
and caught and carried back to their stripes and un- 
requited toil; but I bite my lips and keep quiet. In 
1841, you and I had together a tedious low-water trip 
on a steamboat, from Louisville to St. Louis. You may 
remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the 
mouth of the Ohio, there were on board ten or a dozen 
slaves shackled together with irons. That sight was a 
continued torment to me, and I see something like it 
every time I touch the Ohio or any other slave border. 
It is not fair for you to assume that I have no interest 
in a thing which has, and continually exercises, the 
power of making me miserable. You ought rather to 
appreciate how much the great body of the Northern 
people do crucify their feelings in order to maintain 
their loyalty to the Constitution and the Union. I do 
oppose the extension of slavery, because my judgment 
and feeling so prompt me, and I am under no obligations 
to the contrary. If for this you and I must differ, differ 
we must. You sav if vou were President, vou would 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 135 

send an army and hang the leaders of the Missouri 
outrages upon the Kansas elections; still, if Kansas 
fairly votes herself a slave state she must be admitted, 
or the Union must be dissolved. But how if she votes 
herself a slave state unfairly; that is, by the very means 
for which you say you would hang men? Must she still 
be admitted, or the Union dissolved? That w^ill be the 
phase of the question when it first becomes a practical 
one. In your assumption that there may be a fair de- 
cision of the slavery question in Kansas, I plainl}^ see 
you and I would differ about the Nebraska law. I look 
upon that enactment, not as a law, but as a violence from 
the beginning. It was conceived in violence, is main- 
tained in violence, and is being executed in violence. I 
say it was conceived in violence, because the destruction 
of the Missouri Compromise, under the circumstances, 
was nothing less than violence. It was passed in violence, 
because it could not have passed at all but for the votes 
of many members in violence of the known will of their 
constituents. It is maintained in violence, because the 
elections since clearly demand its repeal, and the demand 
is openly disregarded. 

You say men ought to be hung for the way they are 
executing the law; I say that the way it is being executed 
is quite as good as any of its antecedents. It is being 
executed in the precise way which was intended from the 
first, else why does no Nebraska man express astonish- 
ment or condemnation? Poor Reeder * is the only public 
man who has been silly enough to believe that anything 
like fairness was ever intended, and he has been bravely 
undeceived. 

That Kansas will form a slave constitution, and with 
it will ask to be admitted into the Union, I take to be 

• Andrew H. Reeder was the first territorial governor of 
Kansas, by the appointment of President Pierce. He opposed 
the course of the Administration in respect to Kansas affairs 
and resigned, becoming a member of the free-state party in 
Kansas, 



136 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

already a settled question, and so settled by the very 
means you so pointedly condemn. By every principle 
of law ever held by any court North or South, every 
negro taken to Kansas is free; yet in utter disregard of 
this — in the spirit of violence mereh'^ — that beautiful 
Legislature gravely passes a law to hang any man who 
shall venture to inform a negro of his legal rights. 
This is the subject and real object of the law. If, like 
Haman, they should hang upon the gallows of their 
own building, I shall not be among the mourners for their 
fate. In my humble sphere, I shall advocate the restora- 
tion of the Missouri Compromise so long as Kansas 
remains a territory, and when, by all these foul means, 
it seeks to come into the Union as a slave state, I shall 
oppose it. I am very loath in any case to withhold m}'' 
assent to the enjoyment of property acquired or located 
in good faith ; but I do not admit that good faith in 
taking a negro to Kansas to be held in slavery is a 
probability with any man. Any man who has sense 
enough to be the controller of his own property has too 
much sense to misunderstand the outrageous character 
of the whole Nebraska business. But I digress. In my 
opposition to the admission of Kansas, I shall have some 
company, but we may be beaten. If we are, I shall not, 
on that account, attempt to dissolve the Union. I think 
it probable, however, we shall be beaten. Standing as 
a unit among yourselves, you can, directly and indirectly, 
bribe enough of our men to carry the day, as you could 
on the open proposition to establish a monarchy. Get 
hold of some man in the North whose position and ability 
are such that he can make the support of your measure, 
whatever it may be, a Democratic-party necessity, and 
the thing is done. Apropos of this, let me tell you an 
anecdote. Douglas introduced the Nebraska bill in 
January. In February afterward, there was a called 
session of the Illinois legislature. Of the one hundred 
members composing the two branches of that body, about 



SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 137 

seventy were Democrats. These latter held a caucus, 
in which the Nebraska bill was talked of, if not formally 
discussed. It was thereby discovered that just three, 
and no more, were in favor of the measure. In a day 
or two Douglas's orders came on to have resolutions 
passed approving the bill; and they were passed by large 
majorities ! ! ! The truth of this is vouched for by a 
bolting Democratic member. The masses, too, Demo- 
cratic as well as Whig, were even nearer unanimous 
against it; but as soon as the party necessity of support- 
ing it became apparent, the way the Democrats began 
to see the wisdom and justice of it was perfectly 
astonishing. 

You say that if Kansas fairly votes herself a free 
state, as a Christian you will rejoice at it. All decent 
slaveholders talk that way, and I do not doubt their 
candor. But they never vote that way. Although in a 
private letter or conversation you will express your 
preference that Kansas should be free, you would vote 
for no man for Congress who would say the same thing 
publicly. No such man could be elected from any dis- 
trict in a slave state. You think Stringfellow* and com- 
pany ought to be hung; and yet at the next presidential 
election you will vote for the exact type and representa- 
tive of Stringfellow. The slave breeders and slave 
traders are a small, odious, and detested class among 
you; and yet in politics they dictate the course of all 
of you, and are as completely your masters as you are 
the master of your own negroes. You inquire where I 
now stand. That is a disputed point. I think I am a 
Whig; but others say there are no Whigs, and that I am 
an Abolitionist. When I was at Washington, I voted for 
the Wilmot Proviso as good as forty times; and I never 
heard of anyone attempting to un-Whig me for that. 
I now do no more than oppose the extension of slavery. 

* B. F. Stringfellow, of Missouri, an active pro-slavery par- 
tisan in Kansas. 



138 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I am not a Know-Nothing ;^ that is certain. How could 
I be? How can anyone who abhors the oppression of 
negroes be in favor of degrading classes of white people ? 
Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty 
rapid. As a nation, we began b}'- declaring that ''all men 
are created equal/' We now practically read it^ "all 
men are created equal except negroes." When the Know- 
Nothings get control, it will read, "all men are created 
equal except negroes and foreigners and Catholics." 
When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some 
country where they make no pretense of loving liberty — 
to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken 
pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy. 

Mary will probably pass a day or two in Louisville in 
October. My kindest regards to Mrs. Speed. On the 
leading subject of this letter I have more of her sym- 
pathy than I have of yours ; and yet let me say I am your 
friend forever. 

A. LlNCOL.N 

When the summer of 1856 came, Lincoln was all but con- 
vinced that he belonged in the Republican party. His partner, 
William H. Herndon, had already joined, and had had Lincoln 
appointed a delegate to the state convention. When the con- 
vention met, it was found that, owing to the variety of political 
opinions of the members, it was apparently impossible to unite 
on a statement of principles. Lincoln suggested, "Let us in 
building our new party, make our corner stone the Declaration 
of Independence. Let us build on this rock, and the gates of 
hell shall not prevail against us." The suggestion was approved 
and adopted in a resolution which embodies Lincoln's view of 
the slavery situation. 

"Be>solved, That we hold, in accordance with the opinions and 
prnctices of all the great statesmen of all parties for the first 
sixty years of the administration of the government, that under 
the Constitution, Congress possesses full power to prohibit 

* A secret political part^'' based upon opposition to the partici- 
pation of those of foreign birth in the affairs of government. 
It was also generally hostile to Catholics. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 139 

slavery in the territories; and that, while we will maintain all 
constitutional rights of the South, we also hold that justice, 
humanity, the j^rinciples of freedom, as expressed in our Decla- 
ration of Independence and our national Constitution, and the 
purity and perpetuity of our government require that that 
power should be exerted to prevent the extension of slavery 
into territories heretofore free." 

At the time of the meeting of the convention the country was 
in a fury of excitement over the situation in Kansas and the 
Brooks assault upon Sumner, Some of Lincoln's more con- 
servative friends had tried to keep him away from the con- 
vention, but he and the Whig party had come to the parting of 
the ways, and in the convention he publicly gave his adherence to 
the new party in a speech which, made to an audience composed 
of men who differed on almost every public question except 
the extension of slavery, w^as one of the most fiery in his career. 

This is known as the "Lost Speech," because all the reporters 
except one forgot to take any notes of it. From the notes of 
that one, written up many years later, we get a clear idea of 
its character and power. It has more fire and passion than any- 
other of his addresses and it is to be regretted that the record 
is not wholly accurate. In it appears the second great point 
made in his speeches of this period, namely, that the progress 
of the M^orld and of democracy demanded the preservation of 
the Union, and while the North would not fight on the slavery 
issue, it would for the Union. The close of the speech is 
notable for that and for its intense excitement: 

"The conclusion of all is, that we must restore the Missouri 
Compromise. We must resolve that Kansas shall be free. We 
must reinstate the birthday promise of the Republic; we must 
affirm the Declaration of Independence; we must make good in 
essence as well as in form Madison's avowal that 'the word 
slave ought not to appear in the Constitution'; and we must 
even go further, and decree that only local law, and not that 
time-honored instrument, shall shelter a slave-holder. We must 
make this a land of liberty in fact, as it is in name. But in 
seeking to attain these results — so indispensable if the liberty 
which is our pride and boast shall endure — we will be loyal to 
the Constitution and to the 'flag of our Union,' and no matter 
what our grievance — even though Kansas shall come in as a 



140 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

slave state — and no matter what theirs — even if we shall restore 
the Compromise — we will say to the Southern disunionists, ice 
won't go out of the Union, and you shan't! ! ! 

"But let us, meanwhile, appeal to the sense and patriotism 
of the people, and not to their prejudices; let us spread the 
floods of enthusiasm here aroused all over these vast prairies 
so suggestive of freedom. , . . There is both a power and a 
magic in popular opinion. To that let us now appeal; and 
while, in all probability, no resort to force will be needed, our 
moderation and forbearance will stand us in good stead when, 
if ever, we must make an appeal to battle and to the God of 
hosts! !" 

When the first National Republican Convention met, Lin- 
coln received one hundred and ten votes for Vice President, 
but, fortunately for his future, was not nominated. In the cam- 
paign he headed the Republican electoral ticket and took a 
very active part in the canvass, making more than fifty speeches 
in Illinois and the adjoining states. He was convinced thnt, 
while the people in the country could be brought to see the 
evils and dangers of slavery extension, they were still con- 
servative and would not give their confidence and support to a 
party tainted with abolition or radicalism. His speeches, 
therefore, were cool and restrained throughojit the campaign. 
This was not mere self-restraint for a political end. It well 
represented his own view of the matter. 

There were three parties in the field, the Democrats having 
nominated James Buchanan, the Republicans, John C. Fremont, 
and the remnant of the Whigs and Know-Nothings, ex-Presi- 
dent Millard Fillmore. As an old Whig, Lincoln's influence 
with the doubtful Whigs M^as considerable. He was actively 
engaged in correspondence with many of these during the cam- 
paign, the letter which follows being typical: 

TO J. A. BRITTENHAM 

[Confidential] 

Springfield, September 17, 1856 
J. A. Brittenham, Esq. 

Dear Sir: I understand you are a Fillmore man. 
Let us prove to you that every vote withheld from Fre- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 141 

inont, and given to Fillmore, in this state, actually lessens 
Fillmore's chance of being President. 

Suppose Buchanan gets all the slave states, and Penn- 
sylvania, and any other one state besides; then he is 
elected, no matter who gets all the rest. 

But suppose Fillmore gets the two slave states of 
Maryland and Kentucky; then Buchanan is not elected. 
Fillmore goes into the House of Representatives,^ and 
may be made President by a compromise. 

But suppose again Fillmore's friends throw away a 
few thousand votes on him, in Indiana and Illinois; it 
will inevitably give these states to Buchanan, which will 
more than compensate him for the loss of Maryland and 
Kentucky, will elect him, and leave Fillmore no chance 
in the H. R. or out of it. 

This is as plain as the adding up of the weights of 
three small hogs. As Mr. Fillmore has no possible 
chance to carry Illinois for himself, it is plainly his 
interest to let Fremont take it, and then keep it out of 
the hands of Buchanan. Be not deceived. Buchanan 
is the hard horse to beat in this race. Let him have 
Illinois, and nothing can beat him; and he^ will get 
Illinois, if men persist in throwing away votes upon Mr. 
Fillmore. Does some one persuade you that Mr. Fill- 
more can carry Illinois ? Nonsense ! There are over 
seventy newspapers in Illinois opposing Buchanan, only 
three or four of which support Mr. Fillmore, see the 
rest going for Fremont. Are not these newspapers a 
fair index of the proportion of the voters? If not, tell 
me why. Again, if these three or four Fillmore news- 
papers, two at least, are supported, in part, by the 
Buchanan men, as I understand, do not they know where 
the shoe pinches.^ They know the Fillmore movement 

* If no candidate for President receives a majority of the 
electoral vote, the election is thrown into the House of Repre- 
sentatives, where each state casts one vote and a majority of 
all the states is necessary to an election. 



142 SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 

helps them, and therefore they help it. Do think these 

things over, and then act according to your judgment. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Buchanan's election neither surprised nor discouraged Lin- 
coln. He was fully accustomed to defeat. He devoted him- 
self to holding in line those who were wavering. Immediately 
after the inauguration he was given a new line of argument. 
The Supreme Court of the LTnited States, in its decision in the 
Dred Scott case, declared that a negro, descended from slave 
parents, could not be a citizen of the United States, and that 
neither Congress nor a territorial government could prohibit 
slavery in a territory, and that therefore the Missouri Com- 
promise was null and void. The eifect of the decision in the 
North was to produce a violent uproar, filled with denunciation 
of the Court. Douglas, on the invitation of the United States 
grand jury, came to Springfield on June 12, and spoke in 
defense of the decision, which he indorsed, declaring, however, 
that a territory was still able, by refraining from legislation 
friendly to slavery, to prevent its entrance. This was the first 
statement of Avhat was later called the "Freeport Doctrine." 
He continued, "Their judicial decisions will stand in all future 
time, a proud monument to their greatness, the admiration of 
the good and wise, and a rebuke to the partisans of faction and 
lawless violence. If unfortunately any considerable portion of 
the people of the United States shall so far forget their obli- 
gations to society as to allow the partisan leaders to array them 
in violent resistance to the final decision of the highest tribunal 
on earth, it will become the duty of all the friends of order 
and constitutional government, without reference to past 
political diiferences, to organize themselves and marshal their 
forces under the glorious banner of the I'^nion, in vindication 
of the Constitution and supremacy of the laws over the advo- 
cates of faction and the champions of violence." 

Two weeks later Lincoln answered him in an address to the 
people of Springfield, notable for its discussion of the decision. 
It is one of the cleverest of Lincoln's stump speeches, abound- 
ing in wit and satire. In spite of its seriousness it is full of 
good-natured ridicule, notably in that part in which he discusses 
Douglas's interpretation of the Declaration of Independence. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 143 

SPEECH IN REPLY TO SENATOR DOUGLAS, AT 
SPRINGFIELD, ILL., JUNE 26, 1857 

Fellow-Citizens: I am here tonight, partly by the 
invitation of some of you, and partly by my own incli- 
nation. Two weeks ago Judge Douglas spoke here on 
the several subjects of Kansas, the Dred Scott decision, 
and Utah. I listened to the speech at the time, and 
have the report of it since. It was intended to controvert 
opinions which I think just, and to assail (politically, 
not personally) those men who^ in common with me, 
entertain those opinions. For this reason I wished 
then, and still wish, to make some answer to it, which 
I now take the opportunity of doing. 

I begin with Utah. If it prove to be true, as is prob- 
able, that the people of Utah are in open rebellion^ 
against the United States, then Judge Douglas is in 
favor of repealing their territorial organization, and at- 
taching them to the adjoining states for judicial pur- 
poses. I say, too, if they are in rebellion, they ought 
to be somehow coerced to obedience; and I am not now 
prepared to admit or deny that the Judge's mode of 
coercing them is not as good as any. The Republicans 
can fall in v/ith it without taking back anything they 
have ever said. To be sure, it would be a considerable 
backing down by Judge Douglas from his much-vaunted 
doctrine of self-government for the territories; but this 
is only additional proof of what was very plain from 
the beginning, that that doctrine was a mere deceitful 
pretense for the benefit of slavery. Those who could 
not see that much in the Nebraska act itself, which 
forced governors and secretaries and judges on the 
people of the territories without their choice or con- 
sent, could not be made to see, though one should rise 
from the dead. 

* In 1857 a rebellion occurred in Utah, broug-ht on by the 
removal of Brigham Young from the office of territorial gov- 
ernor. The regular army soon suppressed it without bloodshed. 



144 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

But in all this, it is very plain the Judge evades the 
only question the Republicans have ever pressed upon 
the Democrac}^ in regard to Utah. That question the 
Judge well knew to be this: "If the people of Utah 
shall peacefully form a state constitution tolerating 
polygamy, will the Democracy admit them into the 
Union?" There is nothing in the United States Consti- 
tution or law against polygamy; and why is it not a 
part of the Judge's "sacred right of self-government' 
for the people to have it, or rather to keep it, if they 
choose? These questions, so far as I know, the Judge 
never answers. It might involve the Democracy to 
answer them either way, and they go unanswered. 

KANSAS 

As to Kansas. The substance of the Judge's speech 
on Kansas is an effort to put the free-state men in the 
wrong for not voting at the election of delegates to the 
constitutional convention. He says: "There is every 
reason to hope and believe that the law will be fairly 
interpreted and impartially executed, so as to insure to 
every bona fide inhabitant the free and quiet exercise 
of the elective franchise." 

It appears extraordinary that Judge Douglas should 
make such a statement. He knows that, by the law, no 
one can vote who has not been registered; and he knows 
that the free-state men place their refusal to vote on 
the ground that but few of them have been registered. 
It is possible that this is not true, but Judge Douglas 
knows it is asserted to be true in letters^ newspapers, 
and public speeches, and borne by every mail and blown 
by ever}^ breeze to the eyes and ears of the world. He 
knows it is boldly declared that the people of many 
whole counties, and many whole neighborhoods in others, 
are left unregistered ; yet he does not venture to con- 
tradict the declaration ; or to point out how they can 
vote without being registered; but he just slips along, 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 145 

not seeming to know there is any such question of fact^ 
and complacently declares: ''There is every reason to 
hope and believe that the law will be fairly and im- 
partially executed^ so as to insure to every bona fide 
inhabitant the free and quiet exercise of the elective 
franchise." 

I readily agree that if all had a chance to vote^ they 
ought to have voted. If^ on the contrary, as they allege, 
and Judge Douglas ventures not to particularly contra- 
dict, few only of the free-state men had a chance to 
vote, they were perfectly right in staying from the polls 
in a body. 

By the way, since the Judge spoke, the Kansas elec- 
tion has come off. The Judge expressed his confidence 
that all the Democrats in Kansas would do their duty — 
including "free-state Democrats," of course. The re- 
turns received here as yet are very incomplete; but so 
far as they go, they indicate that only about one-sixth 
of the registered voters have really voted; and this, too, 
when not more, perhaps, than one-half of the rightful 
voters have been registered, thus showing the thing to 
have been altogether the most exquisite farce ever en- 
acted. I am watching with considerable interest to 
ascertain what figure "the free-state Democrats" cut in 
the concern. Of course they voted — all Democrats do 
their duty — and of course they did not vote for slave- 
state candidates. We soon shall know how many dele- 
gates they elected, how many candidates they had 
pledged to a free state, and how many votes were cast 
for them. 

Allow me to barely whisper my suspicion that there 
were no such things in Kansas as "free-state Democrats" 
— that they were altogether mythical, good only to figure 
in newspapers and speeches in the free states. If there 
should prove to be one real living free-state Democrat 
in Kansas, I suggest that it might be well to catch him, 
and stuff and preserve his skin as an interesting speci- 



146 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

men of that soon-to-be-cxtinct variety of the genns 
Democrat. 

THE DRED SCOTT DECISION 

And now as to the Dred Scott decision. That decision 
declares two propositions — first^ that a negro cannot sue 
in the United States courts ; and secondly, that Congress 
cannot prohibit slavery in the territories. It was made 
by a divided court — dividing differently on the different 
points. Judge Douglas does not discuss the merits of 
the decision, and in that respect I shall follow his 
example, believing I could no more improve on McLean ^ 
and Curtis f than he could on Taney. | 

He denounces all who question the correctness of that 
decision, as offering violent resistance to it. But wlio 
resists it.^ Who has, in spite of the decision, declared 
Dred Scott free, and resisted the authority of his master 
over him? 

Judicial decisions have two uses — first, to absolutely 
determine the case decided; and secondly, to indicate 
to the public how other similar cases will be decided 
when they arise. For the latter use, they are called 
"precedents" and "authorities." 

We believe as much as Judge Douglas (perhaps more) 
in obedience to, and respect for, the judicial department 
of government. We think its decisions on constitutional 
questions, when fully settled, should control not only 
the particular cases decided, but the general policy of 
the country, subject to be disturbed only bj^ amendments 
to the Constitution as provided in that instrument itself. 
More than this would be revolution. But we think the 

• John McLean, of Ohio, the Republican member of the 
Supreme Court, who wrote a dissenting opinion in the Dred Scott 
case. 

t Benjamin R. Curtis, of Massachusetts, a Whig member of 
the Supreme Court, who wrote a most powerful dissenting 
opinion in the Dred Scott case. 

t Roger B. Taney, of Maryland, Chief Justice of the United 
States, who wrote the opinion of the Court in the Dred Scott case. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 147 

Dred Scott decision is erroneous. We know the court that 
made it has often overruled its own decisions, and we 
shall do what we can to have it overrule this. We offer 
no resistance to it. 

Judicial decisions are of greater or less authority as 
precedents according to circumstances. That this should 
be so accords both with common sense and the customary 
understanding of the legal profession. 

If this important decision had been made by the 
unanimous concurrence of the judges, and without any 
apparent partisan bias, and in accordance with legal 
public expectation and with the steady practice of the 
departments throughout our history, and had been in no 
part based on assumed historical facts which are not 
really true; or, if wanting in some of these, it had been 
before the court more than once, and had there been 
affirmed and reaffirmed through a course of years, it then 
might be, perhaps would be, factious, nay, even revo- 
lutionary, not to acquiesce in it as a precedent. 

But when^ as is true, we find it wanting in all these 
claims to the public confidence, it is not resistance, it 
is not factious, it is not even disrespectful, to treat it 
as not having yet quite established a settled doctrine 
for the country. But Judge Douglas considers this view 
awful. Hear him: 

"The courts are the tribunals prescribed by the Con- 
stitution and created by the authority of the people to 
determine, expound, and enforce the law. Hence, who- 
ever resists the final decision of the highest judicial 
tribunal aims a deadly blow at our whole republican 
system of government — a blow which, if successful, 
would place all our rights and liberties at the mercy of 
passion, anarchy, and violence. I repeat, therefore, that 
if resistance to the decisions of the Supreme Court of 
the United States, in a matter like the points decided 
in the Dred Scott case, clearly within their jurisdiction 



148 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

as defined by the Constitution, shall be forced upon the 
country as a political issue, it will become a distinct and 
naked issue between the friends and enemies of the 
Constitution — the friends and the enemies of the 
supremacy of the laws." 

Why, this same Supreme Court once decided a na- 
tional bank to be constitutional; but General Jackson, 
as President of the United States, disregarded the de- 
cision, and vetoed a bill for a recharter, partly on con- 
stitutional ground, declaring that each public functionary 
must support the Constitution, "as he understands it.'* 
But hear the General's own words. Here they are, taken 
from his veto message: 

"It is maintained by the advocates of the bank, that 
its constitutionality, in all its features, ought to be con- 
sidered as settled by precedent, and by the decision of 
the Supreme Court. To this conclusion I cannot assent. 
Mere precedent is a dangerous source of authority, and 
should not be regarded as deciding questions of consti- 
tutional power, except where the acquiescence of the 
people and the states can be considered as well settled. 
So far from this being the case on this subject, an argu- 
ment against the bank might be based on precedent. 
One Congress, in 1791, decided in favor of a bank; 
another, in 1811, decided against it. One Congress, in 
1815, decided against a bank; another, in 1816, decided 
in its favor. Prior to the present Congress, therefore, 
the precedents drawn from that source were equal. If 
we resort to the states, the expressions of legislative, 
judicial, and executive opinions against the bank have 
been probably to those in its favor as four to one. There 
is nothing in precedent, therefore, which, if its authority 
were admitted, ought to weigh in favor of the act before 
me." 

I drop the quotations merely to remark that all there 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 149 

ever was in the way of precedent up to the Dred Scott 
decision, on the points therein decided, had been against 
that decision. But hear General Jackson further: 

"If the opinion of the Supreme Court covered the 
whole ground of this act, it ought not to control the 
coordinate authorities of this government. The Con- 
gress, the Executive, and the court must, each for itself, 
be guided by its own opinion of the Constitution. Each 
public officer who takes an oath to support the Consti- 
tution swears that he will support it as he understands 
it^ and not as it is understood by others." 

Again and again have I heard Judge Douglas de- 
nounce that bank decision and applaud General Jackson 
for disregarding it. It would be interesting for him to 
look over his recent speech, and see how exactly his 
fierce philippics against us for resisting Supreme Court 
decisions fall upon his own head. It will call to mind 
a long and fierce political war in this country, upon an 
issue which, in his own language, and, of course, in his 
own changeless estimation, was "a distinct issue between 
the friends and the enemies of the Constitution," and in 
which war he fought in the ranks of the enemies of the 
Constitution. 

I have said, in substance, that the Dred Scott de- 
cision was in part based on assumed historical facts 
which were not really true, and I ought not to leave the 
subject without giving some reasons for saying this; I 
therefore give an instance or two, which I think fully 
sustain me. Chief Justice Taney, in delivering the 
opinion of the majority of the court, insists at great 
length that negroes were no part of the people who 
made, or for whom was made, the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, or the Constitution of the United States. 

On the contrary. Judge Curtis, in his dissenting 
opinion, shows that in five of the then thirteen states — 
to wit, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, New 



150 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Jersey, and North Carolina — free negroes were voters, 
and in proportion to their numbers had the same part in 
making the Constitution that the white people had. He 
shows this with so much particularit}^ as to leave no 
doubt of its truth; and as a sort of conclusion on that 
point, holds the following language: 

"The Constitution was ordained andrcstablished by 
the people of the United States, througli the action, in 
each state, of those persons who were qualified by its 
laws to act thereon in behalf of themselves and all other 
citizens of the state. In some of the states, as we have 
seen^ colored persons were among those qualified by law 
to act on the subject. These colored persons were not 
only included in the body of 'the people of the United 
States' by whom the Constitution was ordained and 
established ; but in at least five of the states they had 
the power to act, and doubtless did act, by their suffrages, 
upon the question of its adoption." 

Again, Chief Justice Taney says: 

"It is difficult at this day to realize the state of public 
opinion, in relation to that unfortunate race, which pre- 
vailed in the civilized and enlightened portions of the 
world at the time of the Declaration of Independence, 
and when the Constitution of the United States was 
framed and adopted." 

And again, after quoting from the Declaration, he 
says: 

"The general words above quoted would seem to in- 
clude the whole human family, and if they were used in 
a similar instrument at this day, would be so under- 
stood." 

In these the Chief Justice does not directly assert, but 
plainly assumes, as a fact, that the public estimate of 
the black man is more favorable now than it was in the ^ 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 151 

days of the Revolution. This assumption is a mistake. 
In some trifling particulars the condition of that race 
has been ameliorated; but as a whole^ in this country, 
the change between then and now is decidedly the other 
way; and their ultimate destiny has never appeared so 
hopeless as in the last three or four years. In two of 
the five states — New Jersey and North Carolina — that 
then gave the free negro the right of voting, which right 
has since been taken away, and in a third — New York — 
it has been greatly abridged; while it has not been ex- 
tended, so far as I know, to a single additional state, 
though the number of the states has more than doubled. 
In those days, as I understand, masters could, at their 
own pleasure, emancipate their slaves; but since then 
such legal restraints have been made upon emancipation 
as to amount almost to prohibition. In those days legis- 
latures held the unquestioned power to abolish slavery 
in their respective states, but now it is becoming quite 
fashionable for state constitutions to withhold that power 
from the legislatures. In those days, by common con- 
sent, the spread of the black man's bondage to the new 
countries was prohibited, but now Congress decides that 
it will not continue the prohibition, and the Supreme 
Court decides that it could not if it would. In those 
days our Declaration of Independence was held sacred 
by all, and thought to include all; but now, to aid in 
making the bondage of the negro universal and eternal, 
it is assailed and sneered at and construed, and hawked 
at, and torn, till, if its framers could rise from their 
graves, they could not at all recognize it. All the powers 
of earth seem rapidlj^ combining against him. Mammon 
is after him, ambition follows, philosophy follows, and 
the theology of the day is fast joining the cry. They 
have him in his prison-house; they have searched his 
person, and left no prying instrument with him. One 
after another they have closed the heavy iron doors 
upon him; and now they have him, as it were, bolted in 



152 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

with a lock of a hundred keys, which can never be 
unlocked without the concurrence of every key — the keys 
in the hands of a hundred different men, and they scat- 
tered to a hundred different and distant places ; and the}^ 
stand musing as to what invention, in all the dominions 
of mind and matter, can be produced to make the im- 
possibility of his escape more complete than it is. 

It is grossly incorrect to say or assume that the public 
estimate of the negro is more favorable now than it was 
at the origin of the government. 

Three years and a half ago, Judge Douglas brought 
forward his famous Nebraska bill. The country was at 
once in a blaze. He scorned all opposition, and carried 
it through Congress. Since then he has seen himself 
superseded in a presidential nomination by one indorsing 
the general doctrine of his measure, but at the same time 
standing clear of the odium of its untimely agitation and 
its gross breach of national faith; and he has seen that 
successful rival constitutionally elected, not by the 
strength of friends, but by the division of adversaries, 
being in a popular minority of nearly four hundred 
thousand votes. He has seen his chief aids in his own 
state. Shields* and Richardson,f politically speaking, 
successively tried, convicted, and executed for an offense 
not their own, but his. And now he sees his own case 
standing next on the docket for trial. 

There is a natural disgust in the minds of nearly all 
white people at the idea of an indiscriminate amalga- 
mation of the white and black races ; and Judge Douglas 
evidently is basing his chief hope upon the chances of 

* James Shields, senator from Illinois, 1849-1855 ; senator from 
Minnesota, 1857-1859. He was later senator from Missouri. So 
far as can be discovered he is the only man who has been senator 
from three states. He was defeated by Lyman Trumbull be- 
cause of his advocacy of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. 

t William A. Richardson, member of Congress from Illinois, 
1847-1856. Later he succeeded Douglas in the Senate. He was 
forced to resign from Congress because of the unpopularity of 
his support of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 153 

his being able to appropriate the benefit of this disgust 
to himself. If he can, by much drumming and repeating, 
fasten the odium of that idea upon his adversaries, he 
thinks he can struggle through the storm. He therefore 
clings to this hope, as a drowning man to the last plank. 
He makes an occasion for lugging it in from the opposi- 
tion to the Dred Scott decision. He finds the Repub- 
licans insisting that the Declaration of Independence 
includes all men, black as well as white, and forthwith 
he boldly denies that it includes negroes at all, and 
proceeds to argue gravely that all who contend it does, 
do so only because they want to vote, and eat, and sleep, 
and marry with negroes ! He will have it that they 
cannot be consistent else. Now I protest against the 
counterfeit logic which concludes that, because I do not 
want a black woman for a slave I must necessarily want 
her for a wife. I need not have her for either. I can 
just leave her alone. In some respects she certainly is 
not my equal; but in her natural right to eat the bread 
she earns with her own hands without asking leave of 
anyone else, she is my equal, and the equal of all others. 

Chief Justice Taney, in the opinion in the Dred Scott 
case, admits that the language of the Declaration is 
broad enough to include the whole human family, but he 
and Judge Douglas argue that the authors of that instru- 
ment did not intend to include negroes, by the fact that 
they did not at once actually place them on an equality 
with the whites. Now this grave argument comes to just 
nothing at all, by the other fact that they did not at 
once, or ever afterward, actually place all white people 
on an equality with one another. And this is the staple 
argument of both the Chief Justice and the Senator for 
doing this obvious violence to the plain, unmistakable 
language of the Declaration. 

I think the authors of that notable instrument intended 
to include all men, but they did not intend to declare 
all men equal in all respects. They did not mean to 



154 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

say all were equal in color, size, intellect, moral develop- 
ments, or social capacity. They defined with tolerable 
distinctness in what respects they did consider all men 
created equal — equal with "certain inalienable rights, 
among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi- 
ness." This they said, and this they meant. They did 
not mean to assert the obvious untruth that all were then 
actually enjoying that equality, nor yet that they were 
about to confer it immediately upon them. In fact, they 
had no power to confer such a boon. They meant simply 
to declare the right^ so that enforcement of it might 
follow as fast as circumstances should permit. 

They meant to set up a standard maxim for free 
society, which should be familiar to all, and revered by 
all; constantly looked to, constantlj^ labored for, and 
even though never perfectly attained, constantly ap- 
proximated, and thereby constantly spreading and deep- 
ening its influence and augmenting the happiness and 
value of life to all people of all colors everywhere. The 
assertion that "All men are created equal" was of no 
practical usTe in effecting our separation from Great 
Britain; and it was placed in the Declaration not for 
that, but for future use. Its authors meant it to be — 
as, thank God, it is now proving itself — a stumbling- 
block to all those who in after times might seek to turn 
a free people back into the hateful paths of despotism. 
They knew the proneness of prosperity to breed tyrants, 
and they meant when such should reappear in this fair 
land and commence their vocation, they should find left 
for them at least one hard nut to crack. 

I have now briefly expressed my view of the m.eaning 
and object of that part of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence which declares that "all men are created equal." 

Now let us hear Judge Douglas's view of the same 
subject, as I find it in the printed report of his late 
speech. Here it is: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN I55 

"No man can vindicate the character, motives, and 
conduct of the signers of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence, except upon the hypothesis that they referred to 
the white race alone, and not to the African, when they 
declared all men to have been created equal; that they 
were speaking of British subjects on this continent being 
equal to British subjects born and residing in Great 
Britain; that they were entitled to the same inalienable 
rights, and among them were enumerated life, liberty, 
and the pursuit of happiness. The Declaration was 
adopted for the purpose of justifying the colonists in 
the eyes of the civilized world in withdrawing their 
allegiance from the British crown, and dissolving their 
connection with the mother country." 

My good friends, read that carefully over some leisure 
hour, and ponder well upon it; see what a mere wreck 
— mangled ruin — it makes of our once glorious Decla- 
ration. 

"They were speaking of British subjects on this con- 
tinent being equal to British subjects born and^ residing 
in Great Britain." Why, according to this, not only 
negroes but white people outside of Great Britain and 
America were not spoken of in that instrument. The 
English, Irish, and Scotch, along with white Americans, 
were included, to be sure, but the French, Germans^ and 
other white people of the world are all gone to pot along 
with the Judge's inferior races ! 

I had thought the Declaration promised something 
better than the condition of British subjects; but no, it 
only meant that we should be equal to them in their own 
oppressed and unequal condition. According to that, it 
gave no promise that, having kicked off the king and 
lords of Great Britain, we should not at once be saddled 
with a king and lords of our own. 

I had thought the Declaration contemplated the 
progressive improvement in the condition of all men 



156 SELECTIONS FRO.M LINCOLN 

everywhere; but no^ it merely "was adopted for the pur- 
pose of justifying the colonists in the eyes of the 
civilized world in withdrawing their allegiance from the 
British crown, and dissolving their connection with the 
mother country/' Why, that object having been effected 
some eighty years ago, the Declaration is of no practical 
use now — mere rubbish — old wadding left to rot on the 
battlefield after the victory is won. 

I understand you are jDreparing to celebrate the 
"Fourth" tomorrow week. What for? The doings of 
that day had no reference to the present; and quite half 
of you are not even descendants of those who were 
referred to at that day. But I suppose you will cele- 
brate, and will even go so far as to read the Declaration. 
Suppose, after you read it once in the old-fashioned way, 
you read it once more with Judge Douglas's version. It 
will then run thus: "We hold these truths to be self- 
evident, that all British subjects who were on this con- 
tinent eighty-one years ago, were created equal to all 
British subjects born and then residing in Great 
Britain.'* 

And now I appeal to all — to Democrats as well as 
others — are you really willing that the Declaration shall 
thus be frittered away ? — thus left no more, at most, than 
an interesting memorial of the dead past? — thus shorn 
of its vitality and practical value, and left without the 
germ or even the suggestion of the individual rights of 
man in it? 



I have said that the separation of the races is the 
only perfect preventive of amalgamation. I have no riglit 
to say all the members of the Republican party are in 
favor of this, nor to say that as a party they are in 
favor of it. There is nothing in their platform directly 
on the subject. But I can say a very large proportion 
of its members are for it, and that the chief plank in their 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN I57 

platform — opposition to the spread of slavery — is most 
favorable to that separation. 

Such separation, if ever effected at all, must be effected 
by colonization;* and no political party, as such, is 
now doing anything directly for colonization. Party 
operations at present only favor or retard colonization 
incidentally. The enterprise is a difficult one; but "where 
there is a will there is a way," and what colonization 
needs most is a hearty will. Will springs from the two 
elements of moral sense and self-interest. Let us be 
brought to believe it is morally right, and at the same 
time favorable to, or at least not against, our interest 
to transfer the African to his native clime, and we shall 
find a way to do it, however great the task may be. The 
children of Israel, to such numbers as to include four 
hundred thousand fighting men, went out of Egyptian 
bondage in a body. 

How differently the respective courses of the Demo- 
cratic and Republican parties incidentally bear on the 
question of forming a will — a public sentiment — for 
colonization, is easy to see. The Republicans inculcate, 
with whatever of ability they can, that the negro is a 
man, that his bondage is cruelly wrong, and that the field 
of his oppression ought not to be enlarged. The Demo- 
crats deny his manhood ; deny, or dwarf to insignificance, 
the wrong of his bondage; so far as possible, crush all 
sympathy for him, and cultivate and excite hatred and 
disgust against him; compliment themselves as Union- 
savers for doing so; and call the indefinite outspreading 
of his bondage "a sacred right of self-government." 

The plainest print cannot be read through a gold eagle; 

and it will be ever hard to find many men who will send 

a slave to Liberia, and pay his passage, while they can 

send him to a new country — Kansas, for instance — and 

sell him for $1500 and the rise. 

* Lincoln's belief in colonization of the negro as a practical 
solution of the question never faltered. It was a major policy 
of his during the war in connection with emancipation. 



158 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Douglas's term in the Senate was to expire in 1859, and it 
was fairly clear that Lincoln would be the Republican candi- 
date against him. But early in 1858, Douglas broke with the 
Buchanan administration on the question of the so-called 
Lecompton Constitution of Kansas, by which the administra- 
tion sought to have the state admitted with slavery. Douglas 
did not believe that the constitution had been fairly adopted, 
and by his opposition he was able to defeat its acceptance by 
Congress. Many Republicans in the East, notably Horace 
Greeley, Samuel Bowles, Henry Wilson, Schuyler Colfax, N. P. 
Banks, and Anson Burlingame favored Republican support 
of Douglas in his fight for reelection. This greatly discour- 
aged Lincoln but without reason. For when the Republican 
convention met in Springfield in June, 1858, it unanimously 
declared him its choice for the Senate. 

On the evening after his nomination Lincoln appeared before 
the convention with a speech which had been prepared more 
carefully than any he had made thus far, and which, contrary 
to custom, he read from the manuscript. He had read it to a 
group of party friends who had severely criticised it as too 
radical in its fundamental statement, contained in the first 
paragraph, and too sectional. It was radical for its time, but 
it was also clever politics to say it, for the time was ripe. It 
was a clever speech also in the way it forced Douglas, in the 
contest which followed, to fight on ground that he had not 
chosen and that he did not like, to discuss the Kansas-Nebraska 
act, the Dred Scott decision, and the character of slavery. It 
is probably the most partisan of all his addresses. 

THE SPRINGFIELD SPEECH 

[June 16', 1858] 
Mr. President, and Gentlemen of the Convention: 
If we could first know where we are, and whither we are 
tending, we could better judge what to do, and how to 
do it. We are now far into the fifth year since a policy 
was initiated with the avowed object and confident 
promise of putting an end to slavery agitation.^ Under 
the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only 

* The reference is to the adoption of the Kansa.s-Nebraska act. 
with popular sovereignty. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 159 

not ceased, but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, 
it will not cease until* a crisis shall have been reached 
and passed. "A house divided against itself cannot 
stand."* I believe this government cannot endure per- 
manently half slave and half free. I do not expect the 
Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall 
— but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will 
become all one thing, or all the other. Either the oppo- 
nents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and 
place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief 
that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its 
advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike 
lawful in all the states, old as well as new — North as 
well as South. 

Have we no tendency to the latter condition.^ 
Let any one who doubts carefully contemplate that 
now almost complete legal combination — piece of machin- 
ery, so to speak — compounded of the Nebraska doctrine 
and the Dred Scott decision.! Let him consider not only 
what work the machinery is adapted to do, and how 
well adapted; but also let him study the history of its 
construction, and trace, if he can, or rather fail, if he 
can, to trace the evidences of design and concert of action 
among its chief architects, from the beginning. 

The new year of 1854 found slavery excluded from 
more than half the states by state constitutions, and 
from most of the national territory by Congressional 
prohibition. I Four days later commenced the struggle 
which ended in repealing that Congressional prohibi- 
tion.** 

* Matthew, xii, 25 ; Mark. iii. 25. 

t The Nebraska doctrine upheld the right of the people of a 
territory to decide, when it was admitted as a state, whether 
it should be free or slave. According- to the Dred Scott decision, 
neither Congress nor the people of a territory could exclude 
slavery from a territory. Lincoln contended that this would 
make slavery in the state a certainty. 

t There were at this time sixteen free and fifteen slave states. 
By the Missouri Compromise slavery had been forbidden in most 
of the territory of the United States. 

** By the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act 



160 SZLECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

This opened all the national territory to slavery, and 
was the first point gained. • 

But, so far, Congress only had acted, and an indorse- 
ment by the people, real or apparent, was indispensable, 
to save the point already gained, and give chance for 
more. 

This necessity had not been overlooked, but had been 
provided for, as well as might be, in the notable argument 
of "squatter sovereignty," otherwise called "sacred right 
of self-government," which latter phrase, though expres- 
sive of the onlj^ rightful basis of any government, was 
so perverted in this attempted use of it as to amount to 
just this: That if any one man choose to enslave another, 
no third man shall be allowed to object. That argument 
was incorporated into the Nebraska bill itself, in the 
language which follows: "It being the true intent and 
meaning of this act not to legislate slavery into any 
territory or state, nor to exclude it therefrom ; but to 
leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regu- 
late their domestic institutions in their own way, subject 
only to the Constitution of the United States." Then 
opened the roar of loose declamation in favor of "squatter 
sovereignty" and "sacred right of self-government." 
"But," said opposition members, "let us amend the bill 
so as to expressly declare that the people of the territory 
may exclude slavery." "Not we," said the friends of 
the measure; and down they voted the amendment. 

While the Nebraska bill was passing through Congress, 
a law case involving the question of a negro's freedom, 
by reason of his owner having voluntarily taken him first 
into a free state and then into a territory covered by the 
congressional prohibition, and held him as a slave for a 
long time in each, was passing through the United States 
Circuit Court for the District of Missouri ; and both 
Nebraska bill and lawsuit were brought to a decision in 
the same month of May, 1854. The negro's name was 
Dred Scott, which name now designates the decision 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 161 

finally made in the case. Before the then next presi- 
dential election, the law case came to and was argued 
in the Supreme Court of the United States; but the 
decision of it was deferred until after the election. Still, 
before the election, Senator Trumbull, on the floor of the 
Senate, requested the leading advocate of the Nebraska 
bill to state his opinion whether the people of a territory 
can constitutionally exclude slavery from their limits;, 
and the latter answered: "That is a question for the 
Supreme Court." 

The election came. Mr. Buchanan was elected, and 
the indorsement, such as it was, secured. That was the 
second point gained. The indorsement, however, fell 
short of a clear popular majority by nearly four hundred 
thousand votes, and so, perhaps, was not overwhelmingly 
reliable and satisfactory. The outgoing President, in his 
last annual message, as impressively as possible echoed 
back upon the people the weight and authority of the 
indorsement! The Supreme Court met again; did not 
announce their decision, but ordered a reargument. The 
presidential inauguration came, and still no decision of 
the court; but the incoming President in his inaugural 
address fervently exhorted the people to abide by the 
forthcoming decision, whatever it might be. Then, in a 
few days, came the decision.^ 

The reputed author of the Nebraska bill finds an early 
occasion to make a speech at this capital indorsing the 
Dred Scott decision, and vehemently denouncing all oppo- 
sition to it. The new President, too, seizes the early 
occasion of the Silliman letterf to indorse and strongly 
construe that decision, and to express his astonishment 
that any different view had ever been entertained ! 

* The decision was handed down on March 6, 1857. 

t Soon after the inauguration of President Buclianan, a com- 
mittee of citizens of Connecticut, headed by Professor Benjamin 
Silliman of Yale, sent a memorial to him, asking for comment 
on the Dred Scott decision and the state of affairs in Kansas. 
He replied, declaring that slavery existed legally in Kansas, 
and added, "How it could have ever been seriously doubted is a 
mystery." 



162 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

At length a squabble springs up between the President 
and the author of the Nebraska bill, on the mere question 
of fact, whether the Lecompton constitution was or was 
not, in any just sense, made by the people of Kansas; 
and in that quarrel, the latter declares that all he wants 
is a fair vote for the people, and that he cares not whether 
slavery be voted down or voted up. I do not understand 
his declaration that he cares not whether slavery be voted 
down or up, to be intended by him other than as an apt 
definition of the policy he would impress upon the public 
mind — the princi23le for which he declares he has suffered 
so much, and is ready to suffer to the end. And well may 
he cling to that principle. If he has any parental feeling, 
well may he cling to it. That principle is the only shred 
left of his original Nebraska doctrine. Under the Dred 
Scott decision, "squatter sovereignty" squatted out of 
existence, tumbled down like temporary scaffolding; like 
the mold at the foundry, it served through one blast, and 
fell back into loose sand — helped to carry an election, 
and then was kicked to the winds. His late joint struggle 
with the Republicans against the Lecompton constitution, 
involves nothing of the original Nebraska doctrine. That 
struggle was made on a point — the right of a people to 
make their own constitution — upon which he and the 
Republicans have never differed. 

The several points of the Dred .Scott decision, in con- 
nection with Senator Douglas's "care not" policy, con- 
stitute the piece of machinery in its present state of 
advancement. This was the third point gained. The 
working points of that machinery are: 

(I) That no negro slave, imported as such from 
Africa, and no descendant of such slave, can ever be a 
citizen of any state, in the sense of that term as used 
in the Constitution of the United States. This point is 
made in order to deprive the negro, in every possible 
event, of the benefit of that provision of the United States 
Constitution which declares that "the citizens of each 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 163 

state shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities 
of citizens in the several states." 

(2) That, "subject to the Constitution of the United 
States/' neither Congress nor a territorial legislature 
can exclude slavery from any United States territory. 
This point is made in order that individual men may fill 
up the territories with slaves, without danger of losing 
them as property, and thus enhance the chances of per- 
manency to the institution through all the future. 

(3) That whether the holding a negro in actual 
slavery in a free state makes him free as against the 
holder, the United States courts will not decide, but will 
leave to be decided by the courts of any slave state the 
negro may be forced into by the master. This point is 
made^ not to be pressed immediately; but, if acquiesced 
in for a while, and apparently indorsed by the people at 
an election, then to sustain the logical conclusion that 
what Dred Scott's master might lawfully do with Dred 
Scott, in the free state of Illinois, every other master 
may lawfully do with any other one, or one thousand 
slaves, in Illinois, or in any other free state. 

Auxiliary to all this, and working hand in hand with 
it, the Nebraska doctrine, or what is left of it, is to 
educate and mold public opinion, at least Northern public 
opinion, not to care whether slavery is voted down or 
voted up. This shows exactly where we now are; and 
partially, also, whither we are tending. 

It will throw additional light on the latter, to go back 
and run the mind over the string of historical facts 
already stated. Several things will now appear less dark 
and mysterious than they did when they were transpiring. 
The people were to be left "perfectly free," "subject 
only to the Constitution." What the Constitution had to 
do with it outsiders could not then see. Plainly enough 
now, it was an exactly fitted niche for the Dred Scott 
decision to afterward come in, and declare the perfect 
freedom of the people to be just no freedom at all. Why 



164 SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 

was the amendment^ expressly declaring the right of the 
people, voted down? Plainly enough now, the adoption 
of it would have spoiled the niche for the Dred Scott 
decision. Why was the court decision held up? Why 
even a Senator's individual opinion withheld till after 
the presidential election? Plainly enough now, the 
speaking out then would have damaged the perfectly free 
argument upon which the election was to be carried. Why 
the outgoing President's felicitation on the indorsement? 
Why the delay of a reargument? Why the incoming 
President's advance exhortation in favor of the decision? 
These things look like the cautious patting and petting 
of a spirited horse preparatory to mounting him, when 
it is dreaded that he may give the rider a fall. And why 
the hasty after-indorsement of the decision by the Presi- 
dent and others ? 

We cannot absolutely know that all these exact adapta- 
tions are the result of preconcert. But when we see a 
lot of framed timbers, different portions of which we 
know have been gotten out at different times and places 
and by different workmen — Stephen, Franklin, Roger, 
and James,* for instance — and we see those timbers 
joined together, and see they exactly make the frame of 
a house or a mill, all the tenons and mortises exactly 
fitting, and all the lengths and proportions of the different 
pieces exactly adapted to their respective places, and not 
a piece too many or too few, not omitting even scaffold- 
ing — or, if a single piece be lacking, we see the place in 
the frame exactly fitted and prepared yet to bring such 
piece in — in such a case we find it impossible not to 
believe that Stephen and Franklin and Roger and James 
all understood one another from the beginning, and all 

* Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James. Senator Stephen A 
Doug-las, former President Franklin Pierce, Chief Justice Roger 
B. Taney, and President James Buchanan are here alluded to. 
Lincoln's charge, though doubtless sincere, was entirely un- 
justified and unworthy of him even in the midst of partisan heat. 
It has never been sustained and there is no reason to believe it 
true. He is also unjust to Douglas in his whole treatment of 
his position on the Lecompton Constitution. 



SELP^CTIONS FROM LINCOLN 155 

worked upon a common plan or draft drawn up before 
the first blow was struck. 

It should not be overlooked that^ by the Nebraska 
bill, the peojole of a state as well as territory were to be 
left "perfectly free/' "subject only to the Constitution." 
Why mention a state? They were legislating for terri- 
tories, and not for or about states. Certainly the people 
of a state are and ought to be subject to the Constitution 
of the United States; but why is mention of this lugged 
into this merely territorial law.^ Why are the people 
of a territory and the people of a state therein lumped 
together, and their relation to the Constitution therein 
treated as being precisely the same? While the opinion 
of the court by Chief Justice Taney, in the Dred Scott 
case, and the separate opinions of all the concurring 
judges, expressly declare that the Constitution of the 
L^nited States neither permits Congress nor a territorial 
legislature to exclude slavery from any United States 
territory, they all omit to declare whether or not the 
same Constitution permits a state, or the people of a 
state, to exclude it. Possibly, this is a mere omission; 
but who can be quite sure, if McLean or Curtis had 
sought to get into the opinion a declaration of unlimited 
power in the people of a state to exclude slavery from 
their limits, just as Chase^ and Macef sought to get 
such declaration, in behalf of the people of a territory, 
into the Nebraska bill — I ask, who can be quite sure that 
it would not have been voted down in the one case as it 
had been in the other? The nearest approach to the 
point of declaring the power of a state over slavery is 
made by Judge Nelson.J He approaches it more than 
once, using the precise idea, and almost the language, too, 

* Salmon P. Chase, Senator from Ohio, who led the opposition 
to the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. He was later Secretary of the 
Treasury in Lincoln's cabinet, and in 1864 was appointed by 
Lincoln Chief Justice of the Supreme Court to succeed Taney. 

t Daniel Mace, a Democratic Senator from Indiana, who was 
one of the leading opponents of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. 

t Samuel Nelson, of New York, one of the Justices of the 
Supreme Court. 



166 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of the Nebraska act. On one occasion his exact language 
is "except in cases where the power is restrained by the 
Constitution of the United States, the law of the state is 
supreme over the subject of slavery within its jurisdic- 
tion." In what cases the power of the state is so restrained 
by the United States Constitution is left an open question, 
precisely as the same question, as to the restraint on the 
power of the territories, was left opien in the Nebraska 
act. Put this and that together, and we have another 
nice little niche, which we may, erelong, see filled with 
another Supreme Court decision, declaring that the Con- 
stitution of the United States does not permit a state to 
exclude slavery from its limits. And this may especially 
be expected if the doctrine of "care not whether slavery 
be voted down or voted up" shall gain upon the public 
mind sufficiently to give promise that such a decision can 
be maintained when made. 

Such a decision is all that slavery now lacks of being 
alike lawful in all the states. Welcome, or unwelcome, 
such decision is probably coming, and v^ill soon be upon 
us, unless the power of the present political dynasty shall 
be met and overthrown. We shall lie down pleasantly 
dreaming that the people of Missouri are on the verge of 
making their state free, and we shall awake to the reality 
instead that the Supreme Court has made Illinois a slave 
state. To meet and overthrow the power of that dynasty 
is the work now before all those who would prevent 
that consummation. That is what we have to do. How 
can we best do it? 

There are those who denounce us openly to their own 

friends, and yet whisper us softly that Senator Douglas 

is the aptest instrument"^ there is with which to effect 

that object. They wish us to infer all this from the 

fact that he now has a little quarrel with the present 

head of the dynasty; and that he has regularly voted 

* The reference was to the Eastern Republicans like Horace 
Greeley, who favored support of Douglas on the ground of his 
opposition to the Lecompton Constitution. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 167 

with us on a single point, upon which he and we have 
never differed. They remind us that he is a great man, 
and that the largest of us are very small ones. Let this 
be granted. But "a living dog is better than a dead 
lion."^ Judge Douglas, if not a dead lion for this work, 
is at least a caged and toothless one. How can he oppose 
the advances of slavery? He don't care anything about 
it. His avowed mission is impressing the "public heart" 
to care nothing about it. A leading Douglas Democratic 
newspaper thinks Douglas's superior talent will be needed 
to resist the revival of the African slave-trade. Does 
Douglas believe an effort to revive that trade is approach- 
ing.^ He has not said so. Does he really think so.'^ But 
if it is, how can he resist it.^ For years he has labored 
to prove it a sacred right of white men to take negro 
slaves into the new territories. Can he possibly show 
that it is less a sacred right to buy them where they can 
be bought cheapest.^ And unquestionably they can be 
bought cheaper in Africa than in Virginia. He has done 
all in his power to reduce the whole question of slavery 
to one of a mere right of property; and, as such, how 
can he oppose the foreign slave-trade — how can he refuse 
that trade in that "property" shall be "perfectly free" — 
unless he does it as a protection to the home production? 
And as the home producers will probably not ask 
the protection, he will be wholly without a ground of 
opposition. 

Senator Douglas holds, we know, that a man may 
rightfully be wiser today than he was yesterday — that he 
may rightfully change when he finds himself wrong. But 
can we, for that reason, run ahead, and infer that he will 
make any particular change, of which he himself has 
given no intimation? Can we safely base our action upon 
any such vague inference? Now, as ever, I wish not to 
misrepresent Judge Douglas's position, question his 
motives, or do aught that can be personally offensive to 

* Ecclesiastes, ix, 4. 



168 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

him. Whenever^, if ever, he and we can come together 
on principle so that our great cause may have assistance 
from his great ability, I hope to have interposed no 
adventitious obstacle. But clearly he is not now with us — 
he does not pretend to be — he does not promise ever to be. 
Our cause, then, must be intrusted to, and conducted 
by, its own undoubted friends — those whose hands are 
free, whose hearts are in the work, who do care for the 
result. Two years ago the Republicans of the nation 
mustered over thirteen hundred thousand strong. We 
did this under the single impulse of resistance to a 
common danger, with every external circumstance against 
us. Of strange, discordant, and even hostile elements, 
we gathered from the four winds, and formed and fought 
the battle through, under the constant hot fire of a dis- 
ciplined, proud, and pampered enemy. Did we brave all 
then to falter now — now, when that same enemy is 
wavering, dissevered, and belligerent.^ The result is 
not doubtful. We shall not fail — if we stand firm, we 
shall not fail. Wise counsels may accelerate or mistakes 
delay it, but, sooner or later, the victory is sure to come. 

Lincoln, almost unknown to the world outside of Illinois, 
now faced one of the ablest and certainly the most brilliant 
political leaders of the day. Douglas had had almost phenomenal 
success in political life. He had been a member of the legis- 
lature at twent)^ -three, a judge of the state supreme court at 
twenty-eight, a member of Congress at thirty, senator at thirty- 
four, and a prominent candidate for the presidency at thirty- 
nine. He was possessed of marvelous magnetism and charm 
of personality, was fearless, resourceful, and eloquent in debate, 
and from long-continued and unbroken success was full of self- 
confidence. Lincoln himself compared them thus: 

"His name fills the nation, and is not unknown even in 
foreign lands. I affect no contempt for the high eminence he 
has reached. So reached that the oppressed of my species 
might have shared with me in the elevation, I would rather 
stand on that eminence than wear the richest crown that ever 
pressed a monarch's brow. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN I69 

"With me the race of ambition has been a failure — a fiat 
failure. With him it has been one of splendid success. Senator 
Douglas is of world-wide renown. All the anxious politicians 
of his party, or who have been of his party for years past, have 
been looking upon him as certainly, at no distant day, to be 
the President of the United States. ... On the contrary 
nobody has ever expected me to be President. . . . We 
have to fight this battle upon principle and upon principle 
alone." 

In the last sentence is found the source of all the confidence 
that Lincoln could muster in the struggle. He was convinced 
after hard study that in this struggle against the spread of 
slavery he had right, justice, history, the Constitution, good 
politics, and the enlightened opinion of mankind on his side. 
On that he had to rest his case. 

Most people thought that the victory would be an easy one 
for Douglas. Lincoln was popular, and his ability was known 
and respected, but he was nowhere regarded as a man of 
destiny. Douglas probably underestimated him as an opponent 
less than even most of Lincoln's friends. He well knew that 
he was more difficult to meet on the stump in Illinois than 
were Seward, Chase, and Sumner on the floor of the United 
States Senate. He said when he heard of Lincoln's nomina- 
tion: "I shall have my hands full. He is the strongest man 
of his party — full of wit, facts, dates — and the best stump 
speaker, with his droll ways and dry jokes, in the West. He 
is as honest as he is shrewd; and if I beat him my victory will 
be hardly won." 

Upon his return from Washington in July, Douglas in a 
speech in Chicago, replied to Lincoln, condemning his acceptance 
speech as sectional and his house-divided doctrine as calculated 
to lead to civil war. He further condemned his attitude on the 
Dred Scott decision as an assault upon the Supreme Court, 
and accused him of being an abolitionist. His speech went 
well with his crowd, and Lincoln's reply the next night was a 
distinct failure. Each made other addresses with the tide 
clearly turning to Douglas, and then Lincoln challenged hira 
to a joint debate. From the standpoint of his friends it was 
a rash and unwise decision; but it was excellent strategy. At 
a stroke, it placed the two upon a common level, greatly to 
Lincoln's advantage, gnd emphasized his power. He had less 



170 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

to lose than Douglas and infinitely more to win. As events 
proved, it had large effects upon the future, but it is well to 
emphasize here the fact that Lincoln, with all his power, was 
seeking to defeat Douglas for the Senate and to replace him 
there. 

Douglas accepted the challenge with secret reluctance, and 
seven debates were arranged and held. They were at Ottawa 
on August 21; Freeport, August 27; Jonesboro, September 15; 
Charleston, September 18; Galesburg, October 7; Quincy, 
October 13; and Alton, October 15. In this way almost every 
part of the state was touched. 

In the debates Lincoln showed himself a master politician 
and an able and shrewd debater, but the speeches are not in 
the class with such speeches as, for instance, his acceptance 
speech. He was not at his best in the debates. Disapproving 
of Douglas and actively disliking him, he was not as a rule as 
courteous as his opponent, nor are his speeches as clean-cut, 
logical, and convincing as others before and after. Nor was 
he as frank as usual. It has been the fashion years later to 
say that Lincoln overwhelmed Douglas in the debates, but this 
was not thought at the time. Lincoln's great victory was indi- 
cated in the amazement of the world that he had been able to 
hold his own with Douglas at all and that he had come so close 
to defeating him. That was what made him known to the 
whole country. 

One thing connected with the debate that bore fruit later 
needs comment here. At Freeport Lincoln insisted upon ask- 
ing Douglas the question: "Can the people of a United States 
territory in any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen 
of the United States, exclude slavery from its limits prior to 
the formation of a State Constitution?" He knew in advance 
what would be Douglas's answer, for the latter had already 
stated it repeatedly, but with public attention outside the state 
directed as it was to the debate, it seemed a good time to 
secure a reiteration of his opinion. Douglas answered it sub- 
stantially as he had stated his position in 1857: 

"Mr. Lincoln knew that T had answered that question over 
and over again. He heard me argue the Nebraska bill on that 
principle all over the state in 1854, in 1855, and in 1856, and 
he has no excuse for pretending to be in doubt as to my posi- 
tion on that question. It matters not what way the Supreme 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LIXCOLN" 17J 

Court may hereafter decide as to the abstract question whether 
slavery may or may not go into a territory under the Consti- 
tution, the people have the lawful means to introduce it or 
exclude it as they please, for the reason that slavery cannot 
exist a day or an hour anywhere unless it is supported by local 
regulations. Those police regulations can only be established 
by the local legislature, and if the people are opposed to* 
slavery they will elect representatives to that body who will by" 
unfriendly legislation effectually prevent the introduction of it 
into their midst. If, on the contrary, they are for it, their 
legislation will favor its extension. Hence, no matter what 
the decision of the Supreme Court may be on that abstract 
question, still the right of the people to make a slave territory 
or a free territory is perfect and complete under the Nebraska 
bill. I hope Mr. Lincoln deems my answer satisfactory on that 
point." 

The following letter of Lincoln, written shortly before the 
Freeport debate, indicates Lincoln's ideas of Douglas's position r 

TO HENRY ASBURY 

Springfield, July 31, 1858 
Henry Asbury, Esq. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 28th is received. The 
points you propose to press upon Douglas he will be 
very hard to get up to, but I think you labor under a 
mistake when you say no one cares how he answers. This 
implies that it is equal with him whether he is injured 
here or at the South. That is a mistake. He cares^ 
nothing for the South ; he knows he is already dead there. 
He only leans Southward more to keep the Buchanan 
part}'- from growing in Illinois. You shall have hard 
work to get him directly to the point whether a territorial 
legislature has or has not the power to exclude slavery. 
But if ybu succeed in bringing him to it — though he will 
be compelled to say it possesses no such power — he will 
instantly take ground that slavery cannot actually exist 
in the territories unless the people desire it, and so give 



172 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

it protection by territorial legislation. If this offends 
the South, he will let it offend them, as at all events he 
means to hold on to his chances in Illinois. You will 
soon learn by the papers that both the Judge and myself 
are to be in Quincy on the 13th of October, when and 
where I expect the pleasure of seeing you. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 
Three other documents of this period throw light on Lincoln. 

AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

[Written for Dictionary of Congress, June, 18581 

Born, February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. 
Profession, a lawyer. 
Education defective. 

Have been a captain of volunteers in Black Hawk War. 
Postmaster at a very small office. 

Four times a member of the Illinois legislature, and 
was a member of the lower house of Congress. 

Yours, etc., 

A. Lincoln 

DEFINITION OF DEMOCRACY 

[August 1 (?), 18581 
As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. 
This expresses my idea of a democracy. Whatever differs 
from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy. 

A. Lincoln 

TO J. N. BROWN 

Springfield, October 18, 1858 

My dear Sir: I do not perceive how I can express 

myself more plainly than I have done in the foregoing 

extracts.* In four of them I have expressly disclaimed 

♦ Lincoln had enclosed him newspaper clippings containing 
extracts from his speeclies. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN IJ^j 

all intentions to bring about social and political equality 
between the white and black raceS;, and, in all the rest, 
I have done the same thing by clear implication. 

I have made it equally plain that I think the negro 
is included in the "men" used in the Declaration of 
Independence. 

I believe the declaration that "all men are created 
equal" is the great fundamental principle upon which 
our free institutions rest; that negro slavery is violative 
of that principle; but that, by our form of government, 
that principle has not been made one of legal obligation ; 
that by our form of government, the states which have 
slavery are to retain it, or surrender it at * their own 
pleasure; and that all others — individuals, free states, 
and national government — are constitutionally bound to 
leave them alone about it. 

I believe our government was thus framed because of 
the necessity springing from the actual presence of 
slavery, when it was framed. 

That such necessity does not exist in the territories, 
where slavery is not present. 

In his Mendenhall speech Mr. Clay says: 

"Now, as an abstract principle, there is no doubt of 
the truth of that declaration (all men are created equal) 
and it is desirable, in the original construction of society, 
and in organized societies, to keep it in view as a great 
fundamental principle." 

Again, in the same speech Mr. Clay says: 

"If a state of nature existed, and we were about to 
lay the foundation of society, no man would be more 
strongly opposed than I would to incorporate the institu- 
tions of slavery among its elements." 

Exactly so. In our new free territories, a state of 
nature does exist. In them Congress lays the foundations 
of society ; and, in laying those foundations, I say, with 



174 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Mr. Clay, it is desirable that the declaration of the 
equality of all men shall be kept in view, as a great 
fundamental principle; and that Congress, which lays 
the foundations of society, should, like Mr. Clay, be 
strongly opposed to the incorporation of slavery among 
its elements. 

But it does not follow that social and political equality 
Ijetween white and black must be incorporated, because 
slavery must not. The declaration does not so require. 

Yours as ever, 

A. Lincoln 

The election was close, but Douglas had a safe majority in 
the legislature and was elected. In spite of the strength he 
had shown, Lincoln was hurt by his defeat. He wrote a friend 
that he was "like the boy that stumped his toe. It hurt too bad 
to laugh, and he was too big to cry." Again he wrote that he 
would rather have a full term in the Senate than to.be Presi- 
dent of the United States. But against his defeat he could set 
the fact that he had won great reputation and that he had much 
advanced the Republican cause. He was now a national figure. 

This letter indicates his attitude after the election. 

TO H. D. SHABPE 

Springfield, December 8, 1858 
H. D. Sharpe, Esq. 

Dear Sir: Your very kind letter of November 9th was 
duly received. I do not know that you expected or 
desired an answer; but glancing over the contents of 
yours again, I am prompted to say that, while I desired 
the result of the late canvass to have been different, I still 
regard it as" an exceedingly small matter. I think we 
have fairly entered upon a durable struggle as to whether 
-this nation is to ultimately become all slave or all free, 
and though I fall early in the contest, it is nothing if I 
shill have contributed, in the least degree, to the final 
rightful result. Respectfully yours, 

A. Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 175 

One of the first indications of the reputation gained by Lin- 
coln in the debates was the flood of letters and invitations which 
poured in on him. He declined most of these because his law 
practice had suffered severely in the four years since 1854 and 
he felt compelled to make money. One of these invitations he 
thus declined: 



TO H. L. PIERCE AND OTHERS 

Spiingfield, TIL, April 6, 1859 

Gentlemen: Your kind note inviting me to attend 
a festival in Boston, on the 28th instant, in honor of the 
birthday of Thomas Jefferson, was duly received. My 
engagements are such that I cannot attend. 

Bearing in mind that about seventy years ago two 
great political parties were first formed in this country, 
that Thomas Jefferson was the head of one of them and 
Boston the headquarters of the other, it is both curious 
and interesting that those supposed to descend politically 
from the party opposed to Jefferson should now be 
celebrating his birthday in their own original seat of 
empire,* while those claiming political descent from him 
have nearly ceased to breathe his name everywhere. 

Remembering, too, that the Jefferson party was formed 
upon its supposed superior deyotion to the personal 
rights of men, holding the rights of property to be 
secondary only, and greatly inferior, and assuming that 
the so-called Democracy of today are the Jefferson, and 
their opponents the anti-Jefferson party, it will be equally 
interesting to note how completely the two have changed 
hands as to the principle upon which they were originally 
supposed to be divided. The Democracy of today hold 
the liberty of one man to be absolutely nothing, when 
in conflict with another man's right of property; 
Republicans, on the contrary, are for both the man and 
the dollar, but in case of conflict the man before the 
dollar. 

* Boston had been a center of Federalism. 



176 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I remember being once much amused at seeing two' 
I3artially intoxicated men engaged in a fight with their 
greatcoats on^ which fight, after a long and rather harm- 
less contest, ended in each having fought himself out of 
his own coat and into that of the other. If the two leading 
parties of this day are really identical with the two in 
the days of Jefferson and Adams, they have performed 
the same feat as the two drunken men. 

But, soberly, it is now no child's play to save the 
principles of Jefferson from total overthrow in this 
nation. One would state with great confidence that he 
could convince any sane child that the simpler j^i'oposi- 
tions of Euclid are true; but nevertheless he would fail, j 
utterly, with one who should deny the definitions and 
axioms. The principles of Jefferson are the definitions 
and axioms of free society. And yet they are denied 
and evaded, with no small show of success. One dashingly 
calls them "glittering generalities." Another bluntly 
calls them "self-evident lies." And others insidiously 
argue that they apply to "superior races." These 
expressions, differing in form, are identical in object 
and effect — the supplanting the principles of free govern- 
ment, and restoring those of classification, caste, and 
legitimacy. They woulcj delight a convocation of crowned 
heads plotting against the people. They are the van- 
guard, the miners and sappers of returning despotism. 
We must repulse them or they will subjugate us. This 
is a world of compensation; and he who would be no 
slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny 
freedom to others deserve it not for themselves, and, 
under a just God, cannot long retain it. All honor to 
Jefferson — to the man who, in the concrete pressure of 
a struggle for national independence by a single people, 
had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into 
a merely revolutionary document an abstract truth, 
applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm 
it there that today and in all coming days it shall, be a 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 177 

rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of 
reappearing tyranny and oppression. 

Your obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 

Two of the calls he felt compelled to answer favorably. 
During the state campaign of 1859 in Ohio, Douglas made 
several speeches, and Lincoln was invited to reply. He spoke 
at Columbus and Cincinnati in September. The Cincinnati 
speech was a very clever stump speech, marked by its good 
humor and genial wit. On account of its being made just 
across the river from Kentucky he addressed much of his 
speech to the Kentuckians. After expressing the firm pur- 
pose of the Republicans to beat Douglas and the Southern 
Democrats, he said: 

"When we do as we say — beat you — ^j'ou perhaps want to 
know what we will do with you. 

"I will tell you, so far as I am authorized to speak for the 
opposition, what we mean to do to you. We mean to treat 
you, as near as we possibly can, as Washington, Jefferson, and 
Madison treated you. We mean to leave you alone, and in no 
way interfere with your institutions; to abide by all and every 
compromise of the Constitution, and in a word, coming back to 
the original proposition, to treat you, so far as degenerated 
men (if we have degenerated) may, according to the examples 
of those noble fathers — Washington, Jefferson, and Madison. 
We mean to remember that you are as good as we; that there 
is no difference between us other than the difference of cir- 
cumstances. We mean to recognize and bear in mind always 
that you have as good hearts in your bosoms as other people, or 
as we claim to have, and treat you accordingly. We mean to 
marry your girls, when we have a chance — the white ones, I 
mean — and I have the honor to inform you that I once did 
have a chance in that way." 

The Columbus speech ranks as one of Lincoln's great polit- 
ical addresses, linking up his former position with the finished 
position of the Cooper Union speech of 1860. In it he defines 
once more his position toward the negro. Douglas and the 
Democrats were accusing him persistently of preaching social 
and political equality, and here he replies. 



178 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

THE COLUMBUS SPEECH 
[September 16, 1859] 

Fellow-Citizens of the State of Ohio: I cannot 
fail to remember that I appear for the first time before 
an audience in this now great state — an audience that is 
accustomed to hear such speakers as Corwin,* and Chase, 
and Wade,t and many other renowned men; and remem- 
bering this, I feel that it will be well for you, as for 
me, that you should not raise your expectations to that 
standard to which you would have been justified in 
raising them had one of these distinguished men appeared 
before you. You would perhaps be only preparing a 
disappointment for yourselves, and, as a consequence of 
your disappointment, mortification to me. I hope, there- 
fore, that you will commence with very moderate expec- 
tations ; and, perhaps, if you will give me your attention^ 
I shall be able to interest you to a moderate degree. 

Appearing here for the first time in my life, I have 
been somewhat embarrassed for a topic by way of intro- 
duction to my speech ; but I have been relieved from that 
embarrassment by an introduction which the Ohio 
Statesman newspaper gave me this morning. In this 
newspaper I have read an article in which, among other 
statements, I find the following: 

"In debating with Senator Douglas during the memor- 
able contest last fall, Mr. Lincoln declared in favor of 
negro suffrage, and attempted to defend that vile concep- 
tion against the Little Giant." 

I mention this now, at the opening of my remarks, 
for the purpose of making three comments upon it. The 
first I have already announced — it furnished me an 
introductory topic ; the second is to show that the gentle- 
man is mistaken; thirdly, to give him an opportunity to 
correct it. 

♦ Thomas Corwin. of Ohio. 
t Benjamin F. Wade, of Ohio. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 179 

In the first place, in regard to this matter being a 
mistake. I have found that it is not entirely safe, when 
one is misrepresented under his very nose, to allow the 
misrepresentation to go uncontradicted. I therefore 
propose, here at the outset, not only to say that this is 
a misrepresentation, but to show conclusively that it is 
so; and you will bear with me while I read a couple of 
extracts from that very "memorable" debate with Judge 
Douglas last year, to which this newspaper refers. In 
the first pitched battle which Senator Douglas and myself 
had, at the town of Ottawa, I used the language which 
I will now read. Having been previously reading an 
extract, I continued as follows : 

"Now, gentlemen, I don't want to read at any greater 
length, but this is the true complexion of all I have ever 
said in regard to the institution of slavery and the black 
race. This is the whole of it, and anything that argues 
me into his idea of perfect social and political equality 
with the negro is but a specious and fantastic arrange- 
ment of words, by which a man can prove a horse-chestnut 
to be a chestnut horse. I will say here, while upon this 
subject, that I have no purpose either directly or indi- 
rectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the 
states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right 
to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. I have no 
purpose to introduce political and social equality between 
the M'hite and the black races. There is a physical 
difference between the two which, in my judgment, will 
probably forever forbid their living together upon the 
footing of perfect equality, and inasmuch as it becomes a 
necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as 
Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong 
having the superior position. I have never said anything 
to the contrary, but I hold that, notwithstanding ail this, 
there is no reason in the world why the negro is not 
entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the 



180 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty, 
and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much 
entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge 
Douglas^ he is not my equal in many respects — certainly 
not in color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endow- 
ments. But in the right to eat the bread, without leave 
of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my 
equal, and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of 
every living man." 

Upon a subsequent occasion, when the reason for 
making a statement like this occurred, I said : 

"While I was at the hotel today an elderly gentleman 
called upon me to know whether I was really in favor of 
producing a perfect equality between the negroes and 
white people. While I had not proposed to myself on 
this occasion to say much on that subject, yet as the 
question was asked me I thought I would occupy perhaps 
five minutes in saying something in regard to it. I will 
say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor 
of bringing about in any way the social and political 
equality of the white and the black races — that I am 
not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or 
jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, 
nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in 
addition to this, that there is a physical difference 
between the white and the black races, which, I believe, 
will forever forbid the two races living together on terms 
of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they 
cannot so live, while they do remain together there must 
be the position of superior and inferior, and I, as much 
as any other man, am in favor of having the superior 
position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occa- 
sion I do not perceive that because the white man is to 
have the superior position, the negro should be denied 
everything. I do not understand that because I do not 
want a negro woman for a slave, I must necessaril}^ want 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 181 

her for a wife. My understanding is that I can just let 
her alone. I am now in my fiftieth year ; and I eertainl}^ 
never have had a black woman for either a slave or a 
wife. So it seems to me quite possible for us to get 
along without making either slaves or wives of negroes. 
I will add to this, that I have never seen to my knowledge 
a man, woman, or child, who was in favor of producing a 
perfect equality, social and political, between negroes and 
white men. I recollect of but one distinguished instance 
that I ever heard of so frequently as to be entirely satis- 
fied of its correctness — and that is the case of Judge 
Douglas's old friend, Colonel Richard M. Johnson. I 
will also add to the remarks I have made (for I am not 
going to enter at large upon this subject)^ that I have 
never had the least apprehension that I or my friends 
would marry negroes, if there were no law to keep them 
from it; but as Judge Douglas and his friends seem to 
be in great apprehension that they might, if there were 
no law to keep them from it, I give him the most solemn 
pledge that I will to the very last stand by the law of 
the state, which forbids the marrying of white people 
with negroes." 

There, my friends, you have briefly what I have, upon 
former occasions, said upon the subject to which this 
newspaper, to the extent of its ability, has drawn the 
public attention. In it you not only perceive, as a prob- 
ability, that in that contest I did not at any time say I 
was in favor of negro suffrage; but the absolute proof 
that twice — once substantially and once expressly — I 
declared against it. Having shown you this, there remains 
but a word of comment upon that newspaper article. It 
is this: that I presume the editor of that paper is an 
honest and truth-loving man, and that he will be greatly 
obliged to me for furnishing him thus early an opportu- 
nity to correct the misrepresentation he has made, before 
it has run so long that malicious people can call him a 
liar. 



182 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

The giant himself has been here recently. I have seen 
a brief l*eport of his speech. If it were otherwise 
unpleasant to me to introduce the subject of the negro 
as a topic for discussion, I might be somewhat relieved 
by the fact that he dealt exclusively in that subj ect while 
he was here. I shall, therefore, without much hesitation 
or diffidence, enter upon this subject. 

The American people, on the first day of January, 
1854, found the African slave-trade prohibited by a law 
of Congress. In a majority of the states of this Union, 
they found African slavery, or any other sort of slavery, 
prohibited by state constitutions. They also found a law 
existing, supposed to be valid, by which slavery was 
excluded from almost all the territory the United States 
then owned. This was the condition of the country, with 
reference to the institution of slavery, on the first of 
January, 1854. A few days after that, a bill was intro- 
duced into Congress, which ran through its regular 
course in the two branches of the national legislature, 
and finally passed into a law in the month of May, by 
which the act of Congress prohibiting slavery from going 
into the territories of the United States was repealed. 
In connection with the law itself, and, in fact, in the 
terms of the law, the then existing prohibition was not 
only repealed, but there was a declaration of a purpose 
on the part of Congress never thereafter to exercise any 
power that they might have, real or supposed, to prohibit 
the extension or spread of slavery. This was a very 
great change; for the law thus repealed was of more 
than thirty years' standing. Following rapidly upon the 
heels of this action of Congress, a decision of the Supreme 
Court is made, by which it is declared that Congress, if 
it desires to prohibit the spread of slavery into the terri- 
tories, has no constitutional power to do so. Not only so, 
but that decision lays down principles, which, if pushed 
to their logical conclusion — I say pushed to their logical 
conclusion — would decide that the constitutions of free 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 183 

states, forbidding slavery, are themselves unconstitu- 
tional. Mark me, I do not say the judges said this, and 
let no man say I affirm the judges used these words; but 
I only say it is my opinion that what they did say, if 
pressed to its logical conclusion, will inevitably result 
thus. 

Looking at these things, the Republican party, as I. 
understand its principles and policy, believes that there 
is great danger of the institution of slavery being spread 
out and extended, until it is ultimately made alike lawful 
in all the states of this Union; so believing, to prevent 
that incidental and ultimate consummation is the original 
and chief purpose of the Republican organization. I 
say "chief purpose" of the Re23ublican organization ; for 
it is certainly true that if the national house shall fall 
into the hands of the Republicans, they will have to attend 
to all the other matters of national housekeeping as well 
as this. The chief and real purpose of the Republican 
party is eminently conservative. It proposes nothing 
save and except to restore this government to its original 
tone in regard to this element of slavery, and there to 
maintain it, looking for no further change in reference 
to it than that which the original framers of the govern- 
ment themselves expected and looked forward to. 

The chief danger to this purpose of the Republican 
party is not just now the revival of the African slave- 
trade, or the passage of a congressional slave-code, or 
the declaring of a second Dred Scott decision, making 
slavery lawful in all the states. These are not pressing 
us just now. They are not quite ready yet. The authors 
of these measures know that we are too strong for them; 
but they will be upon us in due time, and we. will be 
grappling with them hand to hand, if they are not now 
headed off. They are not now the chief danger to the 
purpose of the Republican organization; but the most 
imminent danger that now threatens that purpose is that 
insidious Douglas popular sovereignty. This is the 



184 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

miner and sapper. While it does not propose to revive 
the African slave-trade, nor to pass a slave-code, nor to 
make a second Dred Scott decision, it is preparing us for 
the onslaught and charge of these ultimate enemies when 
they shall be ready to come on, and the word of com- 
mand for them to advance shall be given. I say this 
Douglas popular sovereignty — for there is a broad dis- 
tinction, as I now understand it, between that article and 
a genuine popular sovereignty. 

I believe there is a genuine popular sovereignty. I 
think a definition of genuine pojDular sovereignty, in the 
abstract, would be about this: That each man shall do 
precisely as he pleases with himself, and with all those 
things which exclusively concern him. Applied to govern- 
ment, this principle would be, that a general government 
shall do all those things which pertain to it, and all the 
local governments shall do precisely as they please in 
respect to those matters which exclusively concern them. 
I understand that this government of the United States, 
under which we live, is based upon this principle; and 
I am misunderstood if it is supposed that I have any war 
to make upon that principle. 

Now, what is Judge Douglas's popular sovereignty? 
It is, as a principle, no other than that if one man chooses 
to make a slave of another man, neither that other man 
nor anybody else has a right to object. Applied in 
government, as he seeks to apply it, it is this : If, in a 
new territory into which a few people are beginning 
to enter for the purpose of making their homes, they 
choose to either exclude slavery from their limits or to 
establish it there, however one or the other may affect 
the persons to be enslaved, or the infinitely greater num- 
ber of persons who are afterward to inhabit that territory, 
or the other members of the families of communities, of 
which they are but an incipient member, or the general 
head of the family of states as parent of all — however 
their action may affect one or the other of these, there is 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 185 

no power or right to interfere. That is Douglas's popular 
sovereignty applied. 

He has a good deal of trouble with popular sovereignty. 
His explanations explanatory of explanations explained 
are interminable. The most lengthy and, as I suppose, 
the most maturely considered of his long series of 
explanations is his great essay in Harper's Magazine.'^ 
I will not attempt to enter on any very thorough investi- 
gation of his argument as there made and presented. I 
will nevertheless occupy a good portion of your time here 
in drawing your attention to certain points in it. Such 
of you as may have read this document will have per- 
ceived that the Judge, early in the document, quotes from 
two persons as belonging to the Republican party, with- 
out naming them, but who can readily be recognized as 
being Governor Seward^f of New York, and myself. It 
is true that exactly fifteen months ago this day, I believe, 
I for the first time expressed a sentiment upon this sub- 
ject, and in such a manner that it should get into print, 
that the jjublic might see it beyond the circle of my 
hearers, and my expression of it at that time is the quota- 
tion that Judge Douglas makes. He has not made the 
quotation with accuracy, but justice to him requires me 
to say that it is sufficiently accurate not to change its 
sense. 

The sense of that quotation condensed is this — that 
this slavery element is a durable element of discord 
among us, and that we shall probably not have perfect 
peace in this country with it until it either masters the 
free principle in our government, or is so far mastered 
by the free principle as for the public mind to rest in 
the belief that it is going to its end. That sentiment 

* Doug-las published in Harper's Monthly of September, 1859, 
an article entitled "The Dividing Line Between Federal and 
Local Authority. Popular Sovereignty in the Territories." 

t William H. Seward, former Governor of New York and. at 
the time of Lincoln's speech, United States Senator. He had 
made a speech in which he spoke of the "irrepressible conflict" 
between slavery and freedom, which excited great hostility in 
the South. 



186 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Avhich I now express in this way was^ at no great distance 
of time, perhaps in different language, and in connection 
with some collateral ideas, expressed by Governor 
Seward. Judge Douglas has been so much annoyed by 
the expression of that sentiment that he has constantly, 
I believe, in almost all his speeches since it was uttered, 
been referring to it. I find he alluded to it in his speech 
here, as well as in the copyright essay. I do not now 
enter upon this for the purpose of making an elaborate 
argument to show that we were right in the expression 
of that sentiment. I only ask your attention to this 
matter for the purpose of making one or two points 
upon it. 

If you will read the copyright essay, you will discover 
that Judge Douglas himself says a controversy between 
the American colonies and the government of Great 
Britain began on the slavery question in 1699, and con- 
tinued from that time until the Revolution; and, while 
he did not say so, we all know that it has continued with 
more or less violence ever since the Revolution. 

Then we need not appeal to history, to the declaration 
of the framers of the government, but we know from 
Judge Douglas himself that slavery began to be an 
element of discord among the white people of this country 
as far back as 1699, or one hundred and sixty years ago, 
or five generations of men — counting thirty years to a 
generation. Now it would seem to me that it might have 
occurred to Judge Douglas, or to anybody who had turned 
his attention to these facts, that there was something in 
the nature of that thing, slavery, somewhat durable for 
mischief and discord. 

There is another point I desire to make in regard to 
this matter before I leave it. From the adoption of the 
Constitution down to 1820 is the precise period of our 
history when we had comparative peace upon this ques- 
tion — the precise period of time when we came nearer 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 187 

to having peace about it than any other time of that 
entire one hundred and sixty years^ in which he says it 
began, or of the eighty years of our own Constitution. 
Then it would be worth our while to stop and examine 
into the probable reason of our coming nearer to having 
peace then than at any other time. This was the precise 
period of time in which our fathers adopted, and during 
which they followed, a policy restricting the spread of 
slavery, and the whole Union was acquiescing in it. The 
whole country looked forward to the ultimate extinction 
of the institution. It was when a policy had been 
adopted, and was prevailing, which led all j ust and right- 
minded men to suppose that slavery was gradually coming 
to an end, and that they might be quiet about it, watching 
it as it expired. I think Judge Douglas might have 
perceived that too, and, whether he did or not, it is worth 
the attention of right-minded men, here and elsewhere, to 
consider whether that is not the truth of the case. If he 
had looked at these two facts, that this matter has been 
an element of discord for one hundred and sixty years 
among this people, and that the only comparative peace 
we have had about it was when that policy prevailed in 
this government, which he now wars upon, he might then, 
perhaps, have been brought to a more just appreciation 
of what I said fifteen months ago — that "a house di- 
vided against itself cannot stand. I believe this gov- 
ernment cannot endure permanently half slave and half 
free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved 
— I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it 
will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing 
or all the other. Either the opponents of slaverj^ will 
arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the 
public mind will rest in the belief that it is in tlie course 
of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it 
forward, until it shall become alike lawful in all the 
states, old as well as new. North as well as South." 



188 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

That was my sentiment at that time. In connection 
with it, I said : 

"We are now far into the fifth year since a policy was 
initiated with the avowed object and confident promise 
of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under the oper- 
ation of that polic}^, that agitation has not only not 
ceased, but has constantly augmented." 

I now say to you here that we are advanced still farther 
into the sixth year since that policy of Judge Douglas — 
that popular sovereignty of his for quieting the slavery 
question — was made the national polic3^ Fifteen months 
more have been added since I uttered that sentiment, and 
I call upon you, and all other right-minded men, to say 
whether those fifteen months have belied or corroborated 
my words. 

While I am here upon this subj ect, I cannot but express 
gratitude that the true view of this element of discord 
among us — as I believe it is — is attracting more and more 
attention. I do not believe that Governor Seward uttered 
that sentiment because I had done so before, but because 
he reflected upon this subject, and saw the truth of it. 
Nor do I believe, because Governor Seward or I uttered 
it, that Mr. Hickman,* of Pennsylvania, in different 
language, since that time, has declared his belief in the 
utter antagonism which exists between the principles of 
liberty and slavery. You see we are multiplying. Now, 
while I am speaking of Hickman, let me say I know 
but little about him. I have never seen him, and know 
scarcely anything about the man ; but I will say this much 
about him: Of all the anti-Lecompton Democracy that 
have been brought to my notice, he alone has the true, 
genuine, ring of the metal. And now, without indorsing 
anything else he has said, I will ask this audience to 
give three cheers for Hickman. [The audience responded 
with three rousing cheers for Hickman.] 

* John Hickman, a member of Congress from Pennsylvania. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 189 

Another point in the copyright essay to which I would 
ask your attention is rather a feature to be extracted from 
the whole thing, than from any express declaration of it 
at any point. It is a general feature of that document, 
and indeed, of all of Judge Douglas's discussions of this 
question, that the territories of the United States and the 
states of this Union are exactly alike — that there is no 
difference between them at all — that the Constitution 
applies to the territories precisely as it does to the states 
— and that the United States Government, under the 
Constitution, may not do in a state what it may not do in 
a territory, and what it must do in a state, it must do in 
a territory. Gentlemen, is that a true view of the case? 
It is necessary for this squatter sovereignty; but is it 
true ? 

Let us consider. What does it depend upon.^ It 
depends altogether upon the proposition that the states 
must, without the interference of the General Govern- 
ment, do all those things that pertain exclusively to them- 
selves — that are local in their nature, that have no con- 
nection with the General Government. After Judge 
Douglas has established this proposition, which nobody 
disputes or ever has disputed, he proceeds to assume, 
without proving it, that slavery is one of those little, 
unimportant, trivial matters, which are of just about as 
much consequence as the question v/ould be to me whether 
my neighbor should raise horned cattle or plant tobacco ; 
that there is no moral question about it, but that it is 
altogether a matter of dollars and cents ; that when a new 
territory is opened for settlement, the first man who goes 
into it may plant there a thing which, like the Canada 
thistle, or some other of those pests of the soil, cannot 
be dug out by the millions of men who will come there- 
after ; that it is one of those little things that is so trivial 
in its nature that it has no effect upon anybody save the 
few men who first plant upon the soil; that it is not a 
thing which in any way affects the family of communi- 



190 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

ties composing these states, nor any way endangers the 
General Government. Judge Douglas ignores altogether 
the very well-known fact that we have never had a serious 
menace to our political existence, except it sprang from 
this thing, which he chooses to regard as only upon a 
par with onions and potatoes. 

Turn it, and contemplate it in another view. He says 
that, according to his popular sovereignty, the General 
Government may give to the territories governors, judges, 
marshals, secretaries, and all the other chief men to 
govern them, but they must not touch upon this other 
question. Wh}^ ? The question of who shall be governor 
of a territory for a year or two, and pass away, without 
his track being left upon the soil, or an act which he did 
for good or for evil being left behind, is a question of 
vast national magnitude. It is so much opposed in its 
nature to locality that the nation itself must decide it; 
while this other matter of planting slavery upon a soil — 
a thing which, once planted, cannot be eradicated by the 
succeeding millions who have as much right there as the 
first comers, or if eradicated, not without infinite difficulty 
and a long struggle — he considers the power to prohibit 
it as one of these little, local, trivial things that the nation 
ought not to say a word about; that it affects nobody 
save the few men who are there. 

Take these two things and consider them together, 
present the question of planting a state with the institu- 
tion of slavery by the side of a question of who shall be 
governor of Kansas for a year or two, and is there a 
man here — is there a man on earth — who would not say 
the governor question is the little one, and the slavery 
question is the great one ? I ask any honest Democrat if 
the small, the local, and the trivial and temporary ques- 
tion is not. Who shall be governor.'' — while the durable, 
the important, and the mischievous one is, Shall this soil 
be planted with slavery? 

This is an idea, I suppose, which has arisen in Judge 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 191 

Douglas's mind from his jDcculiar structure. I suppose 
the institution of slavery really looks small to him. He 
is so put up by nature that a lash upon his back would 
luirt him, but a lash upon anybody else's back does not 
hurt him. That is the build of the man, and consequently 
he looks upon the matter of slavery in this unimportant 
light. 

Judge Douglas ought to remember, when he is endeav- 
oring to force this policy upon the American people, 
that while he is put up in that way, a good many are not. 
He ouglit to remember that there was once in this country 
a man by the name of Thomas Jefferson, supposed to be 
a Democrat — a man whose principles and policy are not 
very prevalent amongst Democrats today, it is true; but 
that man did not take exactly this view of the insignifi- 
cance of the element of slavery which our friend Judge 
Douglas does. In contemplation of this thing, we all 
know he was led to exclaim, "I tremble for my country 
when I remember that God is just!" We know how he 
looked upon it when he thus expressed himself. There 
was danger to this country, danger of the avenging justice 
of God, in that little, unimportant popular-sovereignty 
question of Judge Douglas. He supposed there was a 
question of God's eternal justice wrapped up in the 
enslaving of any race of men, or any man, and that those 
M'ho did so braved the arm of Jehovah — that when a 
nation thus dared the Almighty, every friend of that 
nation had cause to dread His wrath. Choose ve between 
Jefferson and Douglas as to what is the true view of 
this element among us. 

There is another little difficulty about this matter of 
treating the territories and states alike in all things, to 
which I ask your attention, and I shall leave this branch 
of the case. If there is no difference between them, why 
not make the territories states at once.'^ What is the 
reason that Kansas was not fit to come into the Union 
when it was organized into a territory, in Judge Douglas's 



192 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

view? Can any of you tell any reason why it should not! 
have come into the Union at once? They are fit, as he 
thinks, to decide upon the slavery question — the largest t 
and most important with which they could possibly deal ; 
what could they do by coming into the Union that they 
are not fit to do, according to his view, by staying out 
of it? Oh, they are not fit to sit in Congress and decide 
upon the rates of postage, or questions of ad valorem or 
specific duties on foreign goods, or live-oak timber con- 
tracts; they are not fit to decide these vastly important 
matters, which are national in their import, but they are 
fit, "from the jump," to decide this little negro question. 
But, gentlemen, the case is too plain; I occupy too much 
time on this head, and I pass on. 

Near the close of the copyright essay, the Judge, I 
think, comes very near kicking his own fat into the fire. 
I did not think when I commenced these remarks that I(| 
would read from that article, but I now believe I will: 

"This exposition of the history of these measures 
shows conclusively that the authors of the compromise 
measures of 1850, and of the Kansas-Nebraska act of 
1854, as well as the members of the Continental Congress 
in 1774, and the founders of our system of government 
subsequent to the Revolution, regarded the people of the 
territories and colonies as political communities which 
were entitled to a free and exclusive power of legislation 
in their provincial legislatures, where their representation 
could alone be preserved, in all cases of taxation and 
internal polity." 

When the Judge saw that putting in the word "slavery" 
would contradict his own history, he put in what he knew 
would pass as synonymous with it — "internal polity." 
Whenever we find that in one of his speeches, the substi- 
tute is used in this manner; and I can tell you the reason. 
It would be too bald a contradiction to say slavery, but 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 193 

"internal polity" is a general phrase which would pass in 
some quarters, and which he hopes will pass with the 
reading community, for the same thing. 

"This right pertains to the people collectively, as a 
law-abiding and peaceful community, and not to the 
isolated individuals who may wander upon the public 
domain in violation of law. It can only be exercised 
where there are inhabitants sufficient to constitute a 
government, and capable of performing its various func- 
tions and duties, a fact to be ascertained and deter- 
mined by " Whom do you think .^ Judge Douglas 

says, "By Congress." 

"Whether the number shall be fixed at ten, fifteen, 
or twenty thousand inhabitants does not affect the 
principle." 

Now I have only a few comments to make. Popular 
sovereignty, by his own words, does not pertain to the 
few persons who wander upon the public domain in viola- 
tion of law\ We have his words for that. When it does 
pertain to them is when they are sufficient to be formed 
into an organized political community, and he fixes the 
minimum for that at 10,000, and the maximum at 20,000. 
Now I v/ould like to know what is to be done with the 
9,000 .'^ Are they all to be treated, until they are large 
enough to be organized into a political community, as 
wanderers upon the public land in violation of law.^ And 
if so treated and driven out, at what point of time would 
there ever be ten thousand } If they were not driven out, 
but remained there as trespassers upon the public land 
in violation of the law, can they establish slavery there? 
No; the Judge says popular sovereignty don't pertain 
to them then. Can they exclude it then.^ No; popular 
sovereignty don't pertain to them then. I would like to 
know, in the case covered by the essay, what condition 
the people of the territory are in before they reach the 
number of ten thousand. 



194 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

But the main point I wish to ask attention to is that 
the question as to when they shall have reached a sufficient 
number to be formed into a regular organized community 
is to be decided "by Congress." Judge Douglas says so. 
Well, gentlemen, that is about all we want. No; that is 
all the Southerners want. That is what all those who are 
for slavery want. They do not want Congress to pro- 
hibit slavery from coming into the new territories, and 
they do not want popular sovereignty to hinder it; and 
as Congress is to say when they are ready to be organized, 
all that the South has to do is to get Congress to hold off. 
Let Congress hold off until they are ready to be admitted 
as a state, and the South has all it wants in taking slavery 
into and planting it in all the territories that we now 
have, or hereafter may have. In a word, the whole thing, 
at a dash of the pen, is at last put in the power of 
Congress; for if they do not have this popular sovereignty 
until Congress organizes them, I ask if it at last does 
not come from Congress.^ If, at last, it amounts to any- 
thing at all. Congress gives it to them. I submit this 
rather for your reflection than for comment. After all 
that is said, at last, by a dash of the pen, everything that 
has gone before is undone, and he puts the whole question 
under the control of Congress. After fighting through 
more than three hours, if you will undertake to read it, 
he at last places the whole matter under the control of 
that power which he had been contending against, and 
arrives at a result directly contrary to what he had been 
laboring to do. He at last leaves the whole matter to 
the control of Congress. 

There are two main objects^ as I understand it, of this 
Harper's Magazine essay. One was to show, if possible, 
that the men of our Revolutionary times were in favor 
of his popular sovereignty; and the other was to show 
that the Dred Scott decision had not entirely squelched 
out this popular sovereignty. I do not propose, in regard 
to this argument drawn from the history of former times. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN I95 

|to enter into a detailed examination of the historical 
statements he has made. I have the impression that they 
are inaccurate in a great many instances; sometimes in 
positive statement^ but very much more inaccurate by the 
suppression of statements that really belong to the 
history. But I do not propose to affirm that this is so 
to any very great extent, or to enter into a very minute 
examination of his^ historical statement. I avoid doing 
so upon this principle — that if it were important for me 
to pass out of this lot in the least period of time possible, 
and I came to that fence and saw by a calculation of my 
own strength and agility that I could clear it at a bound, 
it would be folly for me to stop and consider whether 1 
could or could not crawl through a crack. So I say of 
the whole history contained in his essay, where he 
endeavored to link the men of the Revolution to popular 
sovereignty. It only requires an effort to leap out of it — 
a single bound to be entirely successful. If you read it 
over, you will find that he quotes here and there from 
documents of the Revolutionary times, tending to show 
that the people of the colonies were desirous of regulat- 
ing their own concerns in their own way ; that the British 
Government should not interfere; that at one time they 
struggled with the British Government to be permitted 
to exclude the African slave-trade; if not directly, to be 
permitted to exclude it indirectly by taxation sufficient 
to discourage and destroy it. From these and many 
things of this sort. Judge Douglas argues that they were 
in favor of the people of our own territories excluding 
slavery if they wanted to, or planting it there if they 
wanted to, doing just as they pleased from the time they 
settled upon the territory. Now, however his history 
may apply, and whatever of his argument there may be 
that is sound and accurate or unsound and inaccurate, 
if we can find out what these men did themselves do 
upon this very question of slavery in the territories, does 
it not end the whole thing? If, after all this labor and 



196 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

effort to show that the men of the Revolution were in 
favor of his popular sovereignty and his mode of dealing 
with slavery in the territories, we can show that thesej 
very men took hold of that subject, and dealt with it,' 
we can see for ourselves how they dealt with it. It is 
not a matter of argument or inference, but we know what 
they thought about it. 

It is precisely upon that part of ^ the history of the 
country that one important omission is made by Judge 
Douglas. He selects parts of the history of the United 
States upon the subject of slavery, and treats it as the 
whole, omitting from his historical sketch the legislation 
of Congress in regard to the admission of Missouri, by 
which the Missouri Compromise was established, and 
slavery excluded from a country half as large as the 
present United States. All this is left out of his history, 
and in no wise alluded to by him, so far as I can remem- 
ber, save once, when he makes a remark, that upon his 
principle the Supreme Court was authorized to pronounce 
a decision that the act called the Missouri Compromise 
was unconstitutional. All that history has been left out. 
But this part of the history of the country was not made 
by the men of the Revolution. 

There was another part of our political history made 
by the very men who were the actors in the Revolution, 
which has taken the name of the Ordinance of '87. Let 
me bring that history to your attention. In 1784, I 
believe, this same Mr. Jefferson drew up an ordinance 
for the government of the country upon which we now 
stand; or rather a frame or draft of an ordinance for 
the government of this country, here in Ohio, our neigh- 
bors in Indiana, us who live in Illinois, and our neighbors 
in Wisconsin and Michigan. In that ordinance, drawn 
up not only for the government of that territory, but for 
the territories south of the Ohio River, Mr. Jefferson 
expressly provided for the prohibition of slavery. Judge 
Douglas says, and perhaps he is right, that that provision 



SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 197 

was lost from that ordinance. I believe that is true. 
When the vote was taken upon it, a majority of all 

t)resent in the Congress of the Confederation voted for 
t; but there were so many absentees that those voting 
If or it did not make the clear majority necessary, and it 
was lost. But three years after that the Congress of the 
Confederation were together again, and they adopted 
a new ordinance for the government of this Northwest 
Territory, not contemplating territory south of the river, 
for the states owning that territory had hithero refrained 
from giving it to the General Government; hence they 
made the ordinance to apply only to w^hat the government 
owned. In that, the provision excluding slavery was 
inserted and passed unanimously, or at any rate it passed 
and became a part of the law of the land. Under that 
ordinance we live. First, here, in Ohio, you were a 
territory, then an enabling act was passed, authorizing 
you to form a constitution and state government, provided 
it was Republican, and not in conflict with the ordinance 
of '87. When you framed j^our constitution and presented 
it for admission, I think you will find the legislation upon 
the subject will show that, "whereas 3'ou had formed a 
constitution that was Republican, and not in conflict with 
the ordinance of '87," therefore you were admitted upon 
equal footing with the original states. The same process 
in a few years was gone through with Indiana, and so 
with Illinois, and the same substantially with Michigan 
and Wisconsin. 

Not only did that ordinance prevail, but it was con- 
stantly looked to whenever a step was taken by a new 
territory to become a state. Congress always turned their 
attention to it, and in all their movements upon this 
subject they traced their course by that ordinance of '87. 
When they admitted new states they advertised them of 
this ordinance as a part of the legislation of the country. 
They did so because they had traced the ordinance of '87 
throughout the history of this country. Begin with the 



198 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

men of the Revolution, and go down for sixty entire 
years, and until the last scrap of that territory comes 
into the Union in the form of the state of Wisconsin, 
everything was made to conform to the ordinance of '87^ 
excluding slavery from that vast extent of country. 

I omitted to mention in the right place that the Consti- 
tution of the United States was in process of being framed 
when that ordinance was made by the Congress of the 
Confederation; and one of the first acts of Congress 
itself, under the new Constitution itself, was to give force 
to that ordinance by putting power to carry it out into 
the hands of new officers under the Constitution, in the 
place of the old ones, who had been legislated out of 
existence by the change in the government from the Con- 
federation to the Constitution. Not only so, but I believe 
Indiana once or twice, if not Ohio, petitioned the General 
Government for the privilege of suspending that provision 
and allowing them to have slaves. A report made by 
Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, himself a slaveholder, was 
directly against it, and the action was to refuse them the 
privilege of violating the ordinance of '87. 

This period of history, which I have run over briefly, 
is, I presume, as familiar to most of the assembly as any 
other part of the history of our country. I suppose that 
few of my hearers are not as familiar with that part of 
history as I am, and I only mention it to recall your 
attention to it at this time. And hence I ask how 
extraordinary a thing it is that a man who has occupied 
a position upon the floor of the Senate of the United 
States, who is now in his third term, and who looks to 
see the government of this whole country fall into his 
own hands, pretending to give a truthful and accurate 
history of the slavery question in this country, should so 
entirely ignore the whole of that portion of our history — 
the most important of all. Is it not a most extraordinary 
spectacle, that a man should stand up and ask for any 
confidence in his statements, who sets out as he does 



SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 199 

with portions of history, calling upon the people to believe 
that it is a true and fair representation, when the leading 
part and controlling feature of the whole history is 
carefully suppressed ? 

But the mere leaving out is not the most remarkable 
feature of this most remarkable essay. His proposition 
is to establish that the leading men of the Revolution 
vrere for his great principle of non-intervention by the 
government in the question of slavery in the territories; 
while history shows that they decided in the cases actually 
brought before them in exactly the contrary way, and he 
knows it. Not only did they so decide at that time, but 
they stuck to it during sixty years, through thick and 
thin, as long as there was one of the Revolutionary heroes 
upon the stage of political action. Through their whole 
course, from first to last, they clung to freedom. And 
now he asks the community to believe that the men of 
the Revolution v/ere in favor of his great principle, when 
we have the naked history that they themselves dealt with 
this very subject-matter of his principle, and utterly 
repudiated his principle, acting upon a precisely contrary 
ground. It is as impudent and absurd as if a prosecuting 
attorney should stand up before a jury, and ask them to 
convict A as the murderer of B, while B was walking 
alive before them. 

I say again, if Judge Douglas asserts that the men 
of the Revolution acted upon principles by which, to be 
consistent with themselves, they ought to have adopted 
his popular sovereignty, then, upon a consideration of his 
own argument, he had a right to make you believe that 
they understood the principles of government, but mis- 
applied them — that he has arisen to enlighten the world 
as to the just application of this principle. He has a 
right to try to persuade you that he understands their 
principles better than they did, and therefore he will 
apply them now, not as they did, but as they ought to 
have done. He has a right to go before the community. 



200 SELECTIONS 1 ROM LINCOLN 

and try to convince them of this; but he has no right to 
attempt to impose upon anyone the belief that these 
men themselves approved of his great principle. There 
are two ways of establishing a proposition. One is by 
trying to demonstrate it upon reason, and the other is 
to show that great men in former times have thought so 
and so, and thus to pass it by the weight of pure 
authority. Now if Judge Douglas will demonstrate 
somehow that this is popular sovereignty — the right of 
one man to make a slave of another, without any right 
in that other, or anyone else, to object — demonstrate it 
as Euclid demonstrated propositions — there is no objec- 
tion. But when he comes forward, seeking to carry a 
principle by bringing to it the authority of men who 
themselves utterly repudiated that principle, I ask that 
he shall not be permitted to do it. 

I see, in the Judge's speech here, a short sentence in 
these words: "Our fathers, when they formed this 
government under which we live, understood this question 
just as well and even better than we do now." That is 
true; I stick to that. I will stand by Judge Douglas in 
that to the bitter end. And now. Judge Douglas, come 
and stand by me, and truthfully show how they acted, 
understanding it better than we do. All I ask of you. 
Judge Douglas, is to stick to the proposition that the 
men of the Revolution understood this subject better 
than we do now, and with that better understanding 
they acted better than you are trying to act now. 

I wish to say sometliing now in regard to the Dred 
Scott decision, as dealt with by Judge Douglas. In that 
"memorable debate" between Judge Douglas and myself, 
last year, the Judge thought fit to commence a process 
of catechizing me, and at Freeport I answered his ques- 
tions, and propounded some to him. Among others 
propounded to him was one that I have here now. The 
substance, as I remember it, is: "Can the people of a 
United States territory, under the Dred Scott decision. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 201 

in any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen of the 
United States, exclude slavery from its limits, prior to 
the formation of a state constitution?" He answered 
that they could lawfully exclude slavery from the United 
States territories, notwithstanding the Dred Scott deci- 
sion. There was -something about that answer that has 
probably been a trouble to the Judge ever since. 

The Dred Scott decision expressly gives every citizen 
of the United States a right to carry his slaves into the 
United States territories. And now there was some 
inconsistency in saying that the decision was right, and 
saying, too, that the people of the territory could lawfully 
drive slavery out again. When all the trash, the words, 
the collateral matter, was cleared away from it — all the 
chaff was fanned out of it — it was a bare absurdity: no 
less than that a thing may be lawfully driven away from 
where it has a lawful right to be. Clear it of all the 
verbiage, and that is the naked truth of his proposition — 
that a thing may be lawfully driven from the place where 
it has a lawful right to stay. Well, it was because the 
Judge couldn't help seeing this that he has had so much 
trouble with it; and what I want to ask your especial 
attention to, just now, is to remind you, if you have not 
noticed the fact, that the Judge does not any longer say 
that the people can exclude slavery. He does not say 
so in the copyright essay ; he did not say so in the speech 
that he made here; and, so far as I know, since his 
reelection to the Senate, he has never said, as he did at 
Freeport, that the people of the territories can exclude 
slavery. He desired that you, who wish the territories 
to remain free, should believe that he stands by that 
position, but he does not say it himself. He escapes, to 
some extent, the absurd position I have stated by chang- 
ing his language entirely. What he says now is something 
different in language, and we will consider whether it is 
not different in sense too. It is now that the Dred Scott 
decision^ or rather the Constitution under that decision. 



202 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

does not carry slavery into the territories beyond the 
power of the people of the territories to control it as 
other property. He does not say the people can drive 
it out, but they can control it as other property. The 
language is different; we should consider whether the 
sense is different. Driving a horse out of this lot is too 
plain a proposition to be mistaken about it; it is putting 
him on the other side of the fence. Or it might be a 
sort of exclusion of him from the lot if you were to kill 
him and let the worms devour him; but neither of these 
things is the same as ''controlling him as other property." 
That would be to feed him, to pamper him, to ride him, 
to use and abuse him, to make the most money out of 
him, "as other property"; but, please you, what do the 
men who are in favor of slavery want more than this? 
What do they really want, other than that slavery, being 
in the territories, shall be controlled as other property? 
If they want anything else, I do not comprehend it. 
I ask your attention to this, first, for the purpose of 
pointing out the change of ground the Judge has made; 
and, in the second place, the importance of the change — 
that that change is not such as to give you gentlemen 
who want his popular sovereignty the power to exclude 
the institution or drive it out at all. I know the Judge 
sometimes squints at the argument that in controlling it 
as other property by unfriendly legislation they may 
control it to death, as you might in the case of a horse, 
perhaps, feed him so lightly and ride him so much that 
he would die. But when you come to legislative control, 
there is something more to be attended to. I have no 
doubt, myself, that if the territories should undertake to 
control slave property as other property — that is, control 
it in such a way that it would be the most valuable as 
property, and make it bear its just proportion in the 
way of burdens as property — really deal with it as 
property — the Supreme Court of the United States will 
say, "God speed you, and amen." But I undertake to 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 203 

give the opinion, at least, that if the territories attempt 
by any direct legislation to drive the man with his slave 
out of the territory, or to decide that his slave is free 
because of his being taken in there, or to tax him to such 
an extent that he cannot keep him there, the Supreme 
Court vs'ill unhesitatingly decide all such legislation 
unconstitutional, as long as that Supreme Court is con- 
structed as the Dred Scott Supreme Court is. The first 
two things they have already decided, except that there 
is a little quibble among lawyers between the words dicta 
and decision.* They have already decided that a negro 
cannot be made free by territorial legislation. 

What is that Dred Scott decision? Judge Douglas 
labors to show that it is one thing, while I think it is 
altogether different. It is a long opinion, but it is all 
embodied in this short statement: 

"The Constitution of the United States forbids 
Congress to deprive a man of his property without due 
process of law ; the right of property in slaves is distinctly 
and expressly affirmed in that Constitution ; therefore, if 
Congress shall undertake to say that a man's slave is no 
longer his slave when he crosses a certain line into a 
territory, that is depriving him of his property without 
due process of law, and is unconstitutional." 

There is the whole Dred Scott decision. They add 
that if Congress cannot do so itself, Congress cannot 
confer any power to do so, and hence any effort by the 
territorial legislature to do either of these things is 
absolutelj^ decided against. It is a foregone conclusion 
by that court. 

Now, as to this indirect mode by "unfriendly legisla- 
tion," all lawyers here will readily understand that such 

* A decision of a court is its finding upon a question of law 
or fact arising in a case. A dicticm is a judicial opinion ex- 
pressed by judges on points that do not necessarily arise in the 
case, and are not involved in it. A dictum does not have the 
binding force upon subsequent or inferior courts that is accorded 
to a decision. 



204 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

a proposition cannot be tolerated for a moment, because 
a legislature cannot indirectly do that which it cannot 
accomplish directly. Then I say any legislation to 
control this property, as property, for its benefit as 
property, would be hailed by this Dred Scott Supreme 
Court, and fully sustained; but any legislation driving 
slave property out, or destroying it as property, directly 
or indirectly, will most assuredly by that court be held , 
unconstitutional. ' 

Judge Douglas says that if the Constitution carries 
slavery into the territories, beyond the power of the 
people of the territories to control it as other property, 
then it follows logically that everyone who swears to 
support the Constitution of the United States must give 
that support to that property which it needs. And if 
the Constitution carries slavery into the territories beyond 
the power of the people to control it as other property, 
then it also carries it into the states, because the Consti- 
tution is the supreme law of the land. Now, gentlemen, 
if it were not for my excessive modesty I would say that 
I told that very thing to Judge Douglas quite a year ago. 
This argument is here in print, and if it were not for my 
modesty, as I said, I might call your attention to it. If 
you read it, you will find that I not only made that argu- 
ment, but made it better than he has made it since. 

There is, however^ this difference. I say now, and 
said then, there is no sort of question that the Supreme 
Court has decided that it is the right of the slaveholder 
to take his slave and hold him in the territory ; and, saying 
this, Judge Douglas himself admits the conclusion. He 
says if that is so, this consequence will follow; and 
because this consequence would follow, his argument is, 
the decision cannot therefore be that way — "that would 
spoil my popular sovereignty, and it cannot be possible 
that tliis great principle has been squelched out in this 
extraordinary way. It might be, if it were not for the 
extraordinary consequences of spoiling my humbug." 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLX 205 

Another feature of the Judge's argument about the 
Dred Scott case is an effort to show that that decision 
deals altogether in declarations of negatives ; that the 
Constitution does not affirm anything as expounded by the 
Dred Scott decision, but it only declares a want of power, 
a total absence of power, in reference to the territories. 
It seems to be his purpose to make the whole of that 
decision to result in a mere negative declaration of a want 
of powder in Congress to do anything in relation to this 
matter in the territories. I know the opinion of the judges 
states that there is a total absence of power; but that is, 
unfortunately, not all it states; for the judges add that 
the right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly 
affirmed in the Constitution. It does not stop at saying 
that the right of property in a slave is recognized in the 
Constitution, is declared to exist somewhere in the 
Constitution, but says it is affirmed in the Constitution. 
Its language is equivalent to saying that it is embodied 
and so woven in that instrument that it cannot be detached 
without breaking the Constitution itself. In a word, it 
is part of the Constitution. 

Douglas is singularly unfortunate in his effort to make 
out that decision to be altogether negative, when the 
express language at the vital part is that this is distinctly 
affirmed in the Constitution. I think myself, and I repeat 
it here, that this decision does not merely carry slavery 
into the territories, but by its logical conclusion it carries 
it into the states in which we live. One provision of tliat 
Constitution is that it shall be the supreme law of the 
land — I do not quote the language — any constitution or 
law of any state to the contrary notwithstanding. This 
Dred Scott decision says that the right of property in a 
slave is affirmed in that Constitution which is the supreme 
law of the land, any state constitution or law notwith- 
standing. Then I say that to destroy a thing which is 
distinctly affirmed and supported by the sunreme law of 
the land, even by a state constitution or law. is a violation 



206 SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 

of that supreme law, and there is no escape from it. In 
my judgment there is no avoiding that result, save that 
the American people shall see that state constitutions 
are better construed than our Constitution is construed 
in that decision. Thej^ must take care that it is more 
faithfully and truly carried out than it is there ex- 
pounded. 

I must hasten to a conclusion. Near the beginning 
of my remarks I said that this insidious Douglas popular 
sovereignty is'the measure that now threatens the purpose 
of the Republican party to prevent slavery from being 
nationalized in the United States. I propose to ask your 
attention for a little while to some propositions in 
affirmance of that statement. Take it just as it stands, 
and apply it as a principle; extend and apply that prin- 
ciple elsewhere, and consider where it will lead you. I 
now put this proposition, that Judge Douglas's popular 
sovereignty applied will reopen the African slave-trade; 
and I will demonstrate it by any variety of ways in 
which you can turn the subject or look at it. 

The Judge says that the people of the territories have 
the right, by his principle, to have slaves if they want 
them. Then I say that the people in Georgia have the 
right to buy slaves in Africa if they want them, and I 
defy any man on earth to show any distinction between 
the two things — to show that the one is either more 
wicked or more unlawful ; to show, on original principles, 
that one is better or worse than the other; or to show 
by the Constitution that one differs a whit from the 
other. He will tell me, doubtless, that there is no con- 
stitutional provision against people taking slaves into 
the new territories, and I tell him that there is equally 
no constitutional provision against buying slaves in 
Africa. He will tell you that a people in the exercise 
of popular sovereignty ought to do as they please about 
that tiling, and have slaves if they want them; and I tell 
you tliat the people of Georgia are as much entitled to 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 207 

popular sovereignty, and to buy slaves in Africa, if they 
want them, as the people of the territory are to have 
slaves if they want them. I ask any man, dealing honestly 
with himself, to point out a distinction. 

I have recently seen a letter of Judge Douglas's, in 
which, without stating that to be the object, he doubtless 
endeavors to make a distinction between the two. He 
says he is unalterably opposed to the repeal of the laws 
against the African slave-trade.- And why.^ He then 
seeks to give a reason that would not appl}^ to his popular 
sovereignty in the territories. What is that reason.^ 
"The abolition of the African slave-trade is a compromise 
of the Constitution." I deny it. There is no truth in 
the proposition that the abolition of the African slave- 
trade is a compromise of the Constitution. No man can 
put his finger on anything in the Constitution, or on the 
line of history^ which shows it. It is a mere barren 
assertion, made simply for the purpose of getting up a 
distinction between the revival of the African slave-trade 
and his "great princii^le." 

At the time the Constitution of the United States was 
adopted it was expected that the slave-trade would be 
abolished. I should assert, and insist upon that, if Judge 
Douglas denied it. But I know that it was equally 
expected that slavery would be excluded from the terri- 
tories, and I can show by history that in regard to these 
two things public opinion was exactly alike, while in 
regard to positive action, there was more done in the 
ordinance of '87 to resist the spread of slayery than 
was ever done to abolish the foreign slave-trade. Lest I 
be misunderstood, I say again that at the time of the 
formation of the Constitution, public expectation was 
that the slave-trade would be abolished, but no more so 
than that the spread of slavery in the territories should 
be restrained. They stand alike, except that in the 
ordinance of '87 there was a mark left by public opinion, 
showing that it was more committed against the spread 



208 Sl^LECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of slavery in the territories than against the foreign 
slave-trade. 

Compromise! What word of compromise was there 
about it? Why, the public sense was then in favor of 
the abolition of the slave-trade; but there was at the 
time a very great commercial interest involved in it, and 
extensive capital in that branch of trade. There were 
doubtless the incipient stages of improvement in the 
South in the way of farming, dependent on the slave- 
trade, and they made a proposition to Congress to abolish 
the trade after allowing it twenty years, a sufficient time 
for the capital and commerce engaged in it to be trans- 
ferred to other channels. They made no provision that 
it should be abolished in twenty years; I do not doubt 
that they expected it would be ; but they made no bargain 
about it. The public sentiment left no doubt in the 
minds of any that it would be done away. I repeat, there 
is nothing in the history of those times in favor of that 
matter being a compromise of the Constitution. It was 
the public expectation at the time, manifested in a thou- 
sand ways, that the spread of slavery should also be 
restricted. 

Then I say if this principle is established, that there 

is no wrong in slavery, and whoever wants it has a right 

to have it ; that it is a matter of dollars and cents ; a 

sort of question as to how they shall deal with brutes; 

that between us and the negro here there is no sort of 

question, but that at the South the question is between 

the negro and the crocodile;* that it is a mere matter 

of policy; that there is a perfect right, according to 

interest, to do just as you please — when this is done, 

wdiere this doctrine prevails, the miners and sappers will 

♦After his election in 1858. Douglas made a tour through a 
part of the South, possibly with a view to undoing any damage 
that he had done his popularity there during the debate with 
Lincoln. In a speech at Memphis he said that on the Louisiana 
sugar plantations, it was "not a question between the white man 
and the negro, but between the negro and the crocodile. Between 
the negro and the crocodile. T take the side of the negro ; but 
between the negro and the white man, I go for the white man," 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 209 

have formed public opinion for the slave-trade. They 
will be ready for Jeff Davis and Stephens/ and other 
leaders of that company, to sound the bugle for the 
revival of the slave-trade, for the second Dred Scott 
decision, for the flood of slavery to be poured over the 
free states, while we shall be here tied down and helpless^ 
and run over like sheep. 

It is to be a part and parcel of this same idea to say 
to men who want to adhere to the Democratic party, 
who have always belonged to that party, and are only 
looking about for some excuse to stick to it, but never- 
theless hate slavery, that Douglas's popular sovereignty 
is as good a way as any to oppose slavery. They allow 
themselves to be persuaded easily, in accordance with 
their previous dispositions, into this belief, that it is 
about as good a way of opposing slavery as any, and we 
can do that without straining our old party ties or break- 
ing up old political associations. We can do so without 
being called negro-worshipers. We can do that without 
being subjected to the gibes and sneers that are so readily 
thrown out in place of argument where no argument can 
be found. So let us stick to this popular sovereignty — 
this insidious popular sovereignty. Now let me call your 
attention to one thing that has really happened, which 
shows this gradual and steady debauching of public 
opinion, this course of preparation for the revival of 
the slave-trade, for the territorial slave-code, and the 
new Dred Scott decision that is to carry slavery into 
the free states. Did you ever, five years ago, hear of 
anybody in the world saying that the negro had no share 
in the Declaration of National Independence; that it did 
not mean negroes at all, and when "all men" were spoken 
of, negroes were not included.^ 

I am satisfied that five years ago that proposition was 

* Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, who was at this time the 
Southern leader in the Senate, and Alexander H. Stephens, of 
Georgia, who had served in Congress with Lincoln. They were 
later the President and Vice President of the Confederacy. 



210 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

not put upon paper by any living being anywhere. I 
have been unable at any time to find a man in an audience 
who would declare that he had ever known of anybody 
saying so five years ago. But last year there was not a 
"Douglas popular sovereignty" man in Illinois who did 
not say it. Is there one in Ohio but declares his firm 
belief that the Declaration of Independence did not mean 
negroes at all.'' I do not know how this is; I have not 
been here much; but I presume you are very much alike 
everywhere. Then I suppose that all now express the 
belief that the Declaration of Independence never did 
mean negroes. I call upon one of them to say that he 
said it five years ago. 

If you think that now, and did not think it then, the 
next thing that strikes me is to remark that there has 
been a change wrought in you, and a very significant 
change it is, being no less than changing the negro, in 
your estimation, from the rank of a man to that of a 
brute. They are taking him down, and placing him, when 
spoken of, among reptiles and crocodiles, as Judge 
Douglas himself expresses it. 

Is not this change wrought in your minds a very 
important change.^ Public opinion in this country is 
everything. In a nation like ours this popular sovereignty 
and squatter sovereignty have already wrought a change 
in the public mind to the extent I have stated. There is 
no man in this crowd who contradicts it. 

Now, if you are opposed to slavery honestly, as much 
as anybody, I ask you to note that fact, and the like of 
which is to follow^ to be plastered on, layer after layer, 
until very soon you are prepared to deal with the negro 
everywhere as with the brute. If public sentiment has 
not been debauched already to this point, a new turn of 
the screw in that direction is all that is wanting; and 
this is constantly being done by the teachers of this 
insidious popular sovereignty. You need but one or two 
turns further until your minds, now ripening under these 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 211 

teachings, will be ready for all these things, and you 
will receive and support, or submit to, the slave-trade 
revived with all its horrors, a slave-code enforced in our 
territories, and a new Dred Scott decision to bring 
slavery up into the very heart of the free North.* This, 
I must say, is but carrying out those words prophetically 
spoken hj Mr. Clay many, many years ago — I believe 
more than thirty years — when he told an audience that 
if they would repress all tendencies to liberty and ulti- 
mate emancipation, they must go back to the era of our 
independence and muzzle the cannon which thundered 
its annual joyous return on the Fourth of July; they 
must blow out the moral lights around us; they must 
penetrate the human soul, and eradicate the love of 
liberty; but until they did these things, and others 
eloquently enumerated by him, they could not repress all 
tendencies to ultimate emancipation. 

I ask attention to the fact that in a preeminent degree 
these popular sovereigns are at this work: blowing out 
the moral lights around us; teaching that the negro is 
no longer a man, but a brute ; that the Declaration has 
nothing to do with him ; that he ranks with the crocodile 
and the reptile; that man, with body and soul, is a 
matter of dollars and cents. I suggest to this portion 
of the Ohio Republicans, or Democrats, if there be any 
present, the serious consideration of this fact, that there 
is now going on among you a steady process of debauch- 
ing public opinion on this subject. With this, my friends, 
I bid you adieu. 

In the winter of 1858 J. W. Fell, of Bloomington, Illinois, 
realizing the curiosity prevailing in the East about Lincoln, 
asked him to publish a sketch of himself. In 1859 he renewed 
the suggestion and Lincoln replied: 

* Lincoln insisted that if the principle of the Dred Scott de- 
cision was accepted, it would logically lead to a decision declar- 
ing- that the Constitution of the United States guaranteed the 
right of a slaveholder to take his slaves to free states as well. 



212 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO J. W. FELL 

Springfield, December 20, 1859 
J. W. Fell, Esq. 

My dear Sir: Herewith is a little sketch, as you 
requested. There is not much of it, for the reason, I 
suppose, that there is not much of me. If anything be 
made out of it, I wish it to be modest, and not to go 
beyond the material. If it were thought necessary to 
incorporate anything from any of my speeches, I suppose 
there would be no objection. Of coursfe it must not appear 
to have been written by mj^self. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

I was born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, 
Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of 
undistinguished families — second families, perhaps I 
should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, 
was of a family of the name of Hanks, some of whom 
now reside in Adams, and others in Macon County, 
Illinois. My paternal grandfather, Abraham Lincoln, 
emigrated from Rockingham County, Virginia, to Ken- 
tucky about 1781 or 1782, where a year or two later he 
was killed by the Indians, not in battle, but by stealth, 
when he was laboring to open a farm in the forest. His 
ancestors, who were Quakers, went to Virginia from 
Berks County, Pennsylvania. An effort to identify them 
with the New England family of the same name ended 
in nothing more definite than a similarity of Christian 
names in both families, such as Enoch, Levi, Mordecai, 
Solomon, Abraham, and the like. 

My father, at the death of his father, was but six years 
of age, and he grew up literally without education. He 
removed from Kentucky to what is now Spencer County, 
Indiana, in my eighth year. We reached our new home 

• i 



i 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 213 

about the time the state came into the Union. It was a 
wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still 
in the woods. There I grew up. There were some 
schools, so called, but no qualification was ever required 
of a teacher beyond "readin', writin', and cipherin','' to 
the rule of three. If a straggler supposed to understand 
Latin happened to sojourn in the neighborhood, he was 
looked upon as a wizard. There was absolutely nothing 
to excite ambition for education. Of course, when I 
came of age I did not know much. Still, somehow, I 
could read, write, and cipher to the rule of three, but 
that was all. I have not been to school since. The 
little advance I now have upon this store of education, 
I have picked up from time to time under the pressure 
of necessity. 

I was raised to farm work, which I continued till I 
was twenty-two. At twentj^-one I came to Illinois, 
Macon County. Then I got to New Salem, at that time 
in Sangamon, now in Menard County, where I remained 
a year as a sort of clerk in a store. Then came the Black 
Hawk War; and I was elected a captain of volunteers, 
a success which gave me more pleasure than any I have 
had since. I went the campaign, was elated, ran for the 
legislature the same year (1832), and was beaten — the 
only time I ever have been beaten by the people. The 
next and three succeeding biennial elections I was elected 
to the legislature. I was not a candidate afterward. 
During this legislative period I had studied law, and 
removed to Springfield to practice it. In 1846 I was 
once elected to the lower House of Congress. Was not 
a candidate for reelection. From 1849 to 1854, both 
inclusive, practiced law more assiduously than ever 
before. Always a Whig in politics ; and generally on the 
Whig electoral tickets, making active canvasses. I was 
losing interest in politics when the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise aroused me again. What I have done since 
that is pretty well known. 



214 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

If any personal description of me is thought desirable, 
it may be said I am^ in height, six feet four inches, nearly ; 
lean in flesh, weighing on an average one hundred and 
eighty pounds; dark complexion, with coarse black hair 
and gray eyes. No other marks or brands recollected. 

Yours trulj^, 

A. Lincoln 

In the winter of 1859 Lincoln spoke five times in Kansas, 
and in February, 1860, he made his famous speech in Cooper 
Union. He had been invited, in the fall of 1859, by Henry 
Ward Beecher and the Young Men's Republican Union to 
speak in Brooklyn at the Plymouth Church and had accepted. 
When he reached New York he found that he was to speak in 
Cooper Union, which had only recently been opened. He was 
nervous for fear that his speech was not adapted to the sort of 
audience he would face there, and he spent two days in the 
most careful revision and preparation of his address. Quite the 
best description of the occasion is that of Joseph Choate: 

"He appeared in every sense of the word like one of the 
plain people among whom he loved to be counted. At first 
sight there was nothing impressive or imposing about him— 
except that his great stature singled him out from the crowd; 
his clothes hung awkwardly on his giant frame, his face was of 
a dark pallor, without the slightest tinge of color; his seamed 
and rugged features bore the furrows of hardship and strug- 
gle; his deep-set eyes looked sad and anxious; his counte- 
nance in repose gave little evidence of that brain power which 
raised him from the lowest to the highest station among his 
countrjinen ; as he talked to me before the meeting, he seemed 
ill at ease, with that sort of apprehension which a young man 
might feel before presenting himself to a new and strange 
audience, whose critical disposition he dreaded. It was a 
greal audience, including all the noted men — all the learned 
and cultured— of his party in New York: editors, clergymen, 
statesmen, lawyers, merchants, critics. They were all very 
curious to hear him. His fame as a powerful speaker had pre- 
ceded him, and exaggerated rumor of his wit — the worst fore- 
runner of an orator — had reached the East. When Mr. Bryant * 

* William Cullen Bryant, the distinguished poet and author, 
then editor of the Evening Post. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 215 

presented him, on the high platform of the Cooper Insti- 
tute, a vast sea of eager upturned faces greeted him, full of 
intense curiosity to see what this rude child of the people was 
like. He was equal to the occasion. When he spoke he was 
transformed; his eye kindled, his voice rang, his face shone 
and seemed to light up the whole assembly. For an hour and 
a half he held his audience in the hollow of his hand. His 
style of speech and manner of delivery were severely simple. 
What Lowell called *the grand simplicities of the Bible,' with 
which he was so familiar, were reflected in his discourse. 
With no attempt at ornament or rhetoric, without parade or 
pretense, he spoke straight to the point. If any came ex- 
pecting the turgid eloquence or the ribaldry of the frontier, 
they must have been startled at the earnest and sincere purity 
of his utterances. It was marvelous to see how this untutored 
man, by mere self-discipline and the chastening of his own 
spirit, had outgrown all meretricious arts, and found his own 
way to the grandeur and strength of absolute simplicity. 

"He spoke upon the theme which he had mastered so 
thoroughly. He demonstrated by copious historical proofs 
and masterly logic that the fathers who created the Constitu- 
tion in order to form a more perfect union, to establish j ustice, 
anc to secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their 
posterity, intended to empower the Federal Government to 
exclude slavery from the territories. In the kindliest spirit, 
he protested against the avowed threat of the Southern States 
to destroy the Union if, in order to secure freedom in these 
vast regions out of which future states were to be carved, a 
Republican President were elected. He closed with an appeal 
to his audience, spoken with all the fire of his aroused and 
kindling conscience, with a full outpouring of his love of 
justice and liberty, to maintain their political purpose on that 
lofty and unassailable issue of right and wrong which alone 
could justify it, and not to be intimidated from their high 
resolve and sacred duty by any threats of destruction to the 
government or of ruin to themselves. He concluded with 
this telling sentence, which drove the whole argument home to 
all our hearts: 'Let us have faith that right makes might, 
and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty as 
we imderstand it.' That night the great hall, and the next 
day the whole city, rang with delighted applause and con- 



216 SELECTIONS FRO.M EINCOLN 

gratulations, and he who had come as a stranger departed 
with the laurels of a great triumph." 

The speech made a profound impression. It was published 
in pamphlet form and widely printed in the newspapers. Even 
Greeley's Tribune, not particularly friendly to Lincoln, said of 
it, "No man ever before made such an impression on his first 
appeal to a New York audience." The speech brought Lincoln 
before the East in a new way and made him a presidential 
possibility. For it must be remembered, as James Ford 
Rhodes says, "Before Lincoln made his Cooper Institute 
speech, the mention of his name as a possible nominee for 
President would have been considered as a joke anywhere ex- 
cept in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Iowa." 

The Cooper L^nion speech is Lincoln's last great political 
address and is his best. His thesis was that the men who 
framed the Constitution of the United States believed that 
slavery was an evil, that it should not be extended, and that 
the federal government had power to prohibit it in the terri- 
tories. In his proof of this he showed close investigation of 
the historical sources, a fine literary style, power as an orator, 
and power of the clearest and most logical reasoning. It has 
none of the things that jar as they are read in the debates with 
Douglas, but was pitched on the highest plane Lincolti had yet 
reached. The statesman was beginning to emerge from the 
chrysalis of the politician. It was a fitting climax to the 
period of the struggle against slavery extension. 

THE COOPER UNION SPEECH 

[February 27, 1860] 

Mr. President and Fellow Citizens of New York: 
The facts with which I shall deal this evening are mainly 
old and familiar ; nor is there anything new in the general 
use I shall make of them. If there shall be any novelty, 
it will be in the mode of presenting the facts, and the 
inferences and observations following that presentation. 
In his speech last autumn at Columbus, Ohio, as reported 
in the New York Times, Senator Douglas said: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 217 

"Our fathers, when they framed the government under 
which we live, understood this question just as well, and 
even better, than we do now." 

I fully indorse this, and I adopt it as a text for this 
discourse, I so adopt it because it furnishes a precise 
and an agreed starting-point for a discussion between 
Republicans and that wing of the Democracy headed by 
Senator Douglas. It simply leaves the inquiry: What 
was the understanding those fathers had of the question 
mentioned ? 

What is the frame of government under which we live ? 
The answer must be, "The Constitution of the United 
States." That Constitution consists of the original, 
framed in 1787, and under which the present government 
first went into operation, and twelve subsequently framed 
amendments, the first ten of which were framed in 1789. 

Who were our fathers that framed the Constitution? 
I suppose the "thirty-nine" who signed the original 
instrument may be fairly called our fathers who framed 
that part of the present government. It is almost exactly 
true to say they framed it, and it is altogether true to say 
they fairly represented the opinion and sentiment of the 
whole nation at that time. Their names, being familiar 
to nearly all, and accessible to quite all, need not now 
be repeated. 

I take these "thirty-nine," for the present, as being 
"our fathers who framed the government under which we 
live." What is the question which, according to the text, 
those fathers understood "just as well, and even better, 
than we do now" ? 

It is this: Does the proper division of local from 
federal authority, or anything in the Constitution, forbid 
our federal government to control as to slavery in our 
federal territories? 

Upon this. Senator Douglas holds the affirmative, and 
Republicans the negative. This affirmation and denial 
form an issue; and this issue — this question — is precisely 



218 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

what the text declares our fathers understood "better 
than we." Let us now inquire whether the "thirty-nine/' 
or any of them, ever acted upon this question ; and if they 
did^ how they acted upon it — how they expressed that 
better understanding. In 1784, three years before the 
Constitution, the United States then owning the North- 
western Territory^ and no other, the Congress of the 
Confederation had before them the question of prohibit- 
ing slavery in that territory;* and four of the "thirty- 
nine" who afterward framed the Constitution were in 
that Congress, and voted on that question. Ot these, 
Roger Sherman, Thomas Mifflin, and Hugh Williamson 
voted for the prohibition, thus showing that, in their 
understanding, no line dividing local from federal 
authority, nor anything else, properly forbade the federal 
government to control as to slavery in federal territor^^ 
The other of the four, James McHenry, voted against 
the prohibition, showing that for some cause he thought 
it improper to vote for it. 

In 1787, still before the Constitution, but while the 
convention was in session framing it, and while the 
Northwestern Territory still was the only territory owned 
by the United States^ the same question of prohibiting 
slavery in the territory again came before the Congress 
of the Confederation; and two more of the "thirty-nine" 
who afterward signed the Constitution were in that 
Congress, and voted on the question. They were William 
Blount and William Few; and they both voted for the 
prohibition — thus showing that in their understanding no 
line dividing local from federal authority, nor anything 
else, properly forbade the federal government to control 
as to slavery in federal territory. This time the prohibi- 
tion became a law, being part of what is now well known 
as the Ordinance of '87. 

The question of federal control of slavery in the terri- 

* Jefferson's proposed ordinance of 1784 for the government 
of the Northwest Territory prohibited slavery. It failed, but 
the ordinance of 17 87 was modeled on it. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 219 

tories seems not to have been directly before the conven- 
tion which framed the original Constitution; and hence 
it is not recorded that the "thirty-nine," or any of them, 
while engaged on that instrument, expressed any opinion 
on that precise question. 

In 1789, by the first Congress which sat under the 
Constitution, an act was passed to enforce the Ordinance 
of '87, including the prohibition of slavery in the North- 
western Territory. The bill for this act was reported 
bj^ one of the "thirty-nine" — Thomas Fitzsimmons, then 
a member of the House of Representatives from Penn- 
sj^lvania. It went through all its stages without a word 
of opposition, and finally passed both branches without 
ayes and nays,* which is equivalent to a unanimous 
passage. In this Congress there were sixteen of the 
thirty-nine fathers who framed the original Constitution. 
They were John Langdon, Nicholas Oilman, William S. 
Johnson, Roger Sherman, Robert Morris, Thomas Fitz- 
simmons, William Few, Abraham Baldwin, Rufus King, 
William Paterson, George Clymer, Richard Bassett, 
George Read, Pierce Butler, Daniel Carroll, and James 
Madison. 

This shows that, in their understanding, no line dividing 
local from federal authority, nor anything in the Consti- 
tution, properly forbade Congress to prohibit slavery in 
the federal territory; else both their fidelity to correct 
principle, and their oath to support the Constitution 
would have constrained them to oppose the prohibition. 

Again, George Washington, another of the "thirty- 
nine," was then President of the United States, and as 
such approved and signed the bill, thus completing its 
validity as a law, and thus showing that, in his under- 
standing, no line dividing local from federal authority, 
nor anything in the Constitution, forbade the federal 
government to control as to slavery in federal territory. 

No great while after the adoption of the original Con- 

* A roll-call vote. 



220 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

stitution, North Carolina ceded to the federal government 
the country now constituting the state of Tennessee ; and 
a few years later Georgia ceded that which now consti- 
tutes the states of Mississippi and Alabama. In both 
deeds of cession it was made a condition by the ceding 
states that the federal government should not prohibit 
slavery in the ceded country.* Besides this, slavery was 
then actually in the ceded country. Under these circum- 
stances, Congress, on taking charge of these countries, 
did not absolutely prohibit slavery within them. But 
they did interfere with it — take control of it — even there, 
to a certain extent. In 1798 Congress organized the 
territory of Mississippi. In the act of organization they 
prohibited the bringing of slaves into the territory from 
any place without the United States, by fine, and giving 
freedom to slaves so brought. This act passed both 
branches of Congress without yeas and nays. In that 
Congress were three of the "thirty-nine" who framed the 
original Constitution. They were John Langdon, George 
Read, and Abraham Baldwin. They all probably voted 
for it. Certainly they would have placed their opposition 
to it upon record if, in their understanding, any line 
dividing local from federal authority, or anything in the 
Constitution, properly forbade the federal government 
to control as to slavery in federal territory. 

In 1803 the federal government purchased the 
Louisiana country. Our former territorial acquisitions 
came from certain of our own states; but this Louisiana 
country was acquired from a foreign nation. In 1804 
Congress gave a territorial organization to that part of 
it which now constitutes the state of Louisiana. New 
Orleans, lying within that part, was an old and com- 
paratively large city. There were other considerable 
towns and settlements, and slavery was extensively and 
thoroughly intermingled with the people. Congress did 
not, in the Territorial Act, prohibit slavery; but they 

■== This indicated the prevailing recog-nition of the power of 
Congress over slavery in the territories. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 221 

did interfere with it — take control of it — in a more 
marked and extensive way than they did in the case of 
Mississippi. The substance of the provision therein 
made in relation to slaves was : 

1st. That no slave should be imported into the terri- 
tory from foreign parts. 

2d. That no slave should be carried into it who had 
been imported into the United States since the first day 
of May, 1798. 

3d. That no slave should be carried into it, except 
by the owner, and for his own use as a settler; the penalty 
in all the cases being a fine upon the violator of the law, 
and freedom to the slave. 

This act also was passed without ayes or nays. In the 
Congress which passed it there were two of the- "thirty- 
nine." They were Abraham Baldwin and Jonathan 
Dayton. As stated in the case of Mississippi, it is prob- 
able they both voted for it. They would not have allowed 
it to pass without recording their opposition to it if, in 
their understanding, it violated either the line properly 
dividing local from federal authority, or any provision 
of the constitution. 

In 1819-20 came and passed the Missouri question. 
Many votes were taken, by yeas and nays, in both 
branches of Congress, upon the various phases of the 
general question. Two of the "thirty-nine" — Rufus King 
and Charles Pinckney — were members of that Congress. 
Mr. King steadily voted for slavery prohibition and 
against all compromises, while Mr. Pinckney as steadily 
voted against slavery prohibition and against all com- 
promises. By this, Mr, King showed that, in his under- 
standing, no line dividing local from federal authority, 
nor anything in the Constitution, was violated by 
Congress prohibiting slavery in federal territory; while 
Mr. Pinckney, by his votes, showed that, in his under- 
standing, there, was some sufficient reason for opposing 
such prohibition in that case. 



222 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

The cases I have mentioned are the only acts of the 
"thirty-nine/' or of any of them^ upon the direct issue, 
which I have been able to discover. 

To enumerate the persons who thus acted as being 
four in 1784, two in 1787, seventeen in 1789, three in 
1798, two in 1804, and two in 1819-20, there would be 
thirty of them. But this would be counting John Lang- 
don, Roger Sherman, William Few, Rufus King, and 
George Read each twice, and Abraham Baldwin three 
times. The true number of those of the "thirty-nine" 
whom I have shown to have acted upon the question 
which, by the text, they understood better than we, is 
twenty-three, leaving sixteen not shown to have acted 
upon it in any way. 

Here, then, we have twenty-three out of our thirty-nine 
fathers "who framed the government under which we 
live," who have, upon their official responsibility and 
their corporal oaths,* acted upon the very question which 
the text affirms they "understood just as well, and even 
better than we do now" ; and twenty-one of them — a clear 
majority of the whole "thirty-nine" — so acting upon it 
as to make them guilty of gross political impropriety 
and willful perjury if, in their understanding^ any proper 
division between local and federal authority, or anything 
in the Constitution they had made themselves, and sworn 
to support, forbade the federal government to control 
as to slavery in the federal territories. Thus the twenty- 
one acted ; and, as actions speak louder than words, so 
actions under such responsibility speak still louder. 

Two of the twenty-three voted against congressional 

prohibition of slavery in the federal territories, in the 

instances in which they acted upon the question. But 

for what reasons they so voted is not known. They 

may have done so because they thought a proper division 

* It was an ancient custom to take a particularly binding oath 
with the hand upon the "corporal-cloth," or cloth covering the 
altar at the celebration of the Communion. In time the term 
"corporal oath" was applied to any oath taken with the hand 
upon a sacred object. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 223 

of local from federal authority, or some provision or 
principle of the Constitution, stood in the way; or they 
may, without any such question, have voted against the 
prohibition on what appeared to them to be sufficient 
grounds of expediency. No one who has sworn to support 
j the Constitution can conscientiously vote for what he 
understands to be an unconstitutional measure, however 
expedient he may think it ; but one may and ought to vote 
against a measure which he deems constitutional if, at 
the same time, he deems it inexpedient. It, therefore, 
would be unsafe to set down even the two who voted 
against the prohibition as having done so because, in 
their understanding, any proper division of local from 
federal authority, or anything in the Constitution, forbade 
I the federal government to control as to slavery in federal 
territory. 

The remaining sixteen of the "thirty-nine," so far as I 
have discovered, have left no record of their understand- 
ing upon the direct question of federal control of slavery 
in the federal territories. But there is much reason to 
believe that their understanding upon that question would 
not have appeared different from that of their twenty- 
three compeers, had it been manifested at all. 

For the purpose of adhering rigidly to the text, I 
have purposely omitted whatever understanding may 
have been manifested by any person, however distin- 
guished, other than the thirty-nine fathers who framed 
the original Constitution; and, for the same reason, I 
have also omitted whatever understanding may have been 
manifested hy any of the "thirty-nine" even on any 
other phase of the general question of slavery. If we 
should look into their acts and declarations on those 
other phases, as the foreign slave-trade, and the morality 
and policj/ of slavery generally, it would appear to us 
that on the direct question of federal control of slavery 
in federal territories, the sixteen, if they had acted at 
all, would probably have acted just as the twenty-three 



224 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

did. Among that sixteen were several of the most noted 
anti-slavery men of those times — as Dr. Franklin, Alex- 
ander Hamilton, and Gouverneur Morris — while there 
was not one now known to have been otherwise, unless 1 
it may be John Rutledge, of South Carolina. 

The sum of the whole is that of our thirty-nine fathers 
who framed the original Constitution, twenty-one — a 
clear majority of the whole — certainly understood that 
no proper division of local from federal authority, nor ; 
any part of the Constitution, forbade the federal govern- 
ment to control slavery in the federal territories; while 
all the rest had probably the same understanding. Such, 
unquestionably, was the understanding of our fathers 
who framed the original Constitution ; and the text affirms 
that they understood the question "better than we." 

But, so far, I have been considering the understanding 
of the question manifested by the framers of the original 
Constitution. In and b}^ the original instrument, a mode 
was provided for amending it; and, as I have already 
stated, the present frame of "the government under which 
we live" consists of that original, and twelve amendatory 
articles framed and adopted since. Those who now insist 
that federal control of slavery in federal territories vio- 
lates the Constitution, point us to the provisions which 
they suppose it thus violates; and, as I understand, they 
all fix upon provisions in these amendatory articles, and 
not in the original instrument. The Supreme Court, in the 
.Dred Scott case, plant themselves upon the Fifth Amend- 
ment, which provides that no person shall be deprived 
of "life, liberty, or property without due process of law"; 
while Senator Douglas and his peculiar adherents plant 
themselves upon the Tenth Amendment, providing that 
"the powers not delegated to the United States by the 
Constitution" "are reserved to the states respectively, 
or to the people." 

Now, it so happens tliat these amendments were framed 
by the first Congress wliich sat under the Constitution — 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 225 

the identical Congress which passed the act, already 
mentioned, enforcing the prohibition of slavery in the 
Northwestern Territory. Not only was it the same 
Congress, but they were the identical, same individual 
men who, at the same session, and at the same time 
within the session, had under consideration, and in 
progress toward maturity, these constitutional amend- 
ments, and this act prohibiting slavery in all the territory 
the nation then owned. The constitutional amendments 
were introduced before, and passed after, the act enforc- 
ing the Ordinance of '87; so that, during the whole 
pendency of the act to enforce the ordinance, the consti- 
tutional amendments were also pending. 

The seventy-six members of that Congress, including 
sixteen of the framers of the original Constitution, as 
before stated, were preeminently our fathers who framed 
that part of "the government under which we live" which 
is now claimed as forbidding the federal government to 
control slavery in the federal territories. 

Is it not a little presumptuous in anyone at this day 
to affirm that the two things which that Congress de- 
liberately framed, and carried to maturity at the same 
time, are absolutely inconsistent with each other .^ And 
does not such affirmation become imjDudently absurd when 
coupled with the other affirmation, from the same mouth, 
that those who did the two things alleged to be incon- 
sistent, understood whether they really were inconsistent 
better than we — better than he who affirms that they are 
inconsistent ? 

It is surely safe to assume that the thirty-nine framers 
of the original Constitution, and the seventy-six members 
of the Congress which framed the amendments thereto, 
taken together, do certainly include those wiio may be 
fairly called "our fathers who framed the government 
under which we live." And so assuming, I defy any man 
to show that any one of them ever, in his whole life, 
declared that, in his understanding, any proper division 



226 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of local from federal authority, or any part of the Con- 
stitution, forbade the federal government to control as 
to slavery in the federal territories. I go a step further. 
I defy anyone to show that any living man in the whole 
world ever did, prior to the beginning of the present 
century (and I might almost say prior to the beginning 
of the last half of the present century), declare that, in 
his understanding, any proper division of local from 
federal authority, or any part of the Constitution, forbade 
the federal government to control as to slavery in the fed- 
eral territories. To those who now so declare I give not 
only "our fathers who framed the government under 
which we live," but with them all other living men w^ithin 
the century in which it was framed, among whom to 
search, and the}^ shall not be able to find the evidence 
of a single man agreeing with them. 

Now, and here, let me guard a little against being 
misunderstood. I do not mean to say we are bound to 
follow implicitly in whatever our fathers did. To do so 
would be to discard all the lights of current experience 
- — to reject all i3rogress, all improvement. What I do 
say is that if we would supplant the opinions and policy 
of our fathers in any case, we should do so upon evidence 
so conclusive, and argument so clear, that even their 
great authority, fairly considered and weighed, cannot 
stand; and most surely not in a case whereof we our- 
selves declare they understood the question better than 
we. 

If any man at this day sincerely believes that a proper 
division of local from federal authority, or any part of 
the Constitution, forbids the federal government to con- 
trol as to slavery in the federal territories, he is right 
to say so, and to enforce his position by all truthful 
evidence and fair argument which he can. But he has 
no right to mislead others who have less access to his- 
tory, and less leisure to study it, into the false belief 
that "our fathers who framed the government under 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 227 

which we live" were of the same opinion — thus substi- 
tuting falsehood and deception for truthful evidence and 
fair argument. If any man at this day sincerely believes 
"our fathers who framed the government under which 
we live" used and applied principles, in other cases, 
which ought to have led them to understand that a proper 
division of local from federal authority, or some part of 
the Constitution, forbids the federal government to con- 
trol as to slavery in the federal territories, he is right 
to say so. But he should, at the same time, brave the 
responsibility of declaring that, in his opinion, he under- 
stands their principles better than they did themselves ; 
and especially should he not shirk that responsibility by 
asserting that they "understood the question just as well, 
and even better, than we do now." 

But enough ! Let all who believe that "our fathers 
who framed the government under which we live under- 
stood this question just as well, and even better, than 
w^e do now," speak as they spoke, and act as they acted 
upon it. This is all Republicans ask — all Republicans 
desire — in relation to slavery. As those fathers marked 
it, so let it be again marked, as an evil not to be extended, 
but to be tolerated and protected only because of and so 
far as its actual presence among us makes that toleration 
and protection a necessity. Let all the guaranties those 
I fathers gave it be not grudgingly, but fully and fairly, 
maintained. For this Republicans contend, and with 
this, so far as I know or believe, they will be content. 

And now, if they would listen — as I suppose the}^ will 
not — I would address a few words to the Southern 
people. 

I would say to them: You consider yourselves a 
reasonable and a just people; and I consider that in the 
general qualities of reason and justice you are not in- 
ferior to any other people. Still, when you speak of 
us Republicans, you do so only to denounce us as reptiles, 
or, at the best, as no better than outlaws. You will 



228 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 



grant a hearing to pirates or murderers, but nothing like 
it to "Black Republicans." * In all your contentions 
with one another, each of you deems an unconditional 
condemnation of "Black Republicanism" as the first 
thing to be attended to. Indeed, such condemnation of 
us seems to be an indispensable prerequisite — license, so 
to speak — among jou to be admitted or permitted to 
speak at all. Now can you or not be prevailed upon to 
pause and to consider whether this is quite just to us, 
or even to yourselves? Bring forward your charges and 
specifications, and then be patient long enough to hear 
us deny or justify. 

You say we are sectional. We deny it. That makes 
an issue; and the burden of proof is upon you.f You 
produce your proof; and what is it? Why, that our 
party has no existence in your section — gets no votes in 
jour section. The fact is substantially true; but does 
it prove the issue? If it does, then in case we should, 
without change of principle, begin to get votes in your 
section, we should thereby cease to be sectional. You 
cannot escape this conclusion; and yet, are you willing 
to abide by it? If you are, you will probably soon find 
that we have ceased to be sectional, for we shall get 
votes in your section this very year. You will then begin 
to discover, as the truth plainly is, that your proof does 
not touch the issue. The fact that we get no votes in 
your section is a fact of your making, and not of ours. 
And if there be fault in that fact, that fault is primarily 
yours, and remains so until you show that we repel you 
by some wrong principle or practice. If we do repel 
you by any wrong principle or practice, the fault is 
ours; but this brings you to where you ought to have 
started — to a discussion of the right or wrong of our 

* A term of reproach employed in the country by the oppo- 
nents of the new party. 

t Under the law a person is innocent until he is proved guilty. 
The accuser thus has upon him what is called the burden of 
proof, that is, the necessity of proving the guilt of the accused. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 229 

principle. If our principle, put in practice, would wrong 
your section for the benefit of ours, or for any other 
object, then our principle, and we with it, are sectional, 
and are justly opposed and denounced as such. Meet 
us, then, on the question of whether our principle, put 
in practice, would wrong your section; and so meet us 
as if it were possible that something may be said on 
our side. Do you accept the challenge.^ No! Then 
you really believe that the principle which "our fathers 
who framed the government under which we live" 
thought so clearly right as to adopt it, and indorse it 
again and again, upon their official oaths, is in fact so 
clearly wrong as to demand your condemnation without 
a moment's consideration. 

Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the warning 
against sectional parties given by Washington in his 
Farewell Address. Less than eight years before Wash- 
ington gave that warning, he had, as President of the 
United States, approved and signed an act of Congress 
enforcing the prohibition of slavery in the Northwestern 
Territory, which act embodied the policy of the govern- 
ment upon that subject up to and at the very moment 
he penned that warning; and about one year after he 
penned it, he wrote Lafayette that he considered that 
prohibition a wise measure, expressing in the same con- 
nection his hope that we should at some time have a 
confederacy of free states. 

Bearing this in mind, and seeing that sectionalism 
has since arisen upon this same subject, is that warning 
a weapon in your hands against us, or in our hands 
against you.^ Could Washington himself speak, would 
he cast the blame of that sectionalism upon us, who 
sustain his policy, or upon you, who repudiate it.^ We 
respect that warning of Washington, and we commend 
it to you, together with his example pointing to the right 
application of it. 

But you say you are conservative — eminently con- 



230 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

servative — while we are revolutionary, destructive, or 
something of the sort. What is conservatism? Is it 
not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and 
untried? We stick to, contend for, the identical old 
policy on the point in controversy which was adopted 
by "our fathers who framed the government under which 
we live"; while you with one accord reject, and scout, 
and spit upon that old policy, and insist upon substi- 
tuting something new. True, you disagree among your- 
selves as to what that substitute shall be. You are 
divided on new propositions and plans, but you are 
unanimous in rejecting and denouncing the old policy 
of the fathers. Some of you are for reviving the foreign 
slave-trade; some for a congressional slave-code for the 
territories; some for Congress forbidding the territories 
to prohibit slavery within their limits ; some for main- 
taining slavery in the territories through the judiciary; 
some for the "gur-reat pur-rinciple" that "if one man 
would enslave another, no third man should object," 
fantastically called "popular sovereignty"; but never a 
man among you is in favor of federal prohibition of 
slavery in federal territories, according to the practice 
of "our fathers who framed the government under which 
we live." Not one of all your various plans can show a 
precedent or an advocate in the century within which 
our government originated. Consider, then, whether 
your claim of conservatism for yourselves, and your 
charge of destru'ctiveness against us, are based on the 
most clear and stable foundations. 

Again, you say we have made the slaverj'' question 
more prominent than it formerlj^ was. We deny it. We 
admit that it is more prominent, but we deny that we 
made it so. It was not we, but you, who discarded the 
old policy of the fathers. We resisted, and still resist, 
your innovation; and thence comes the greater promi- 
nence of the question. Would you have that question 
reduced to its former proportions? Go back to that old 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 231 

policy. What has been will be again, under the same 
conditions. If you would have the peace of the old 
times, readopt the precepts and policy of the old times. 

You charge that we stir up insurrections among your 
slaves. We deny it; and what is your proof? Harpers 
Ferry ! John Brown ! ! * John Brown was no Repub- 
lican; and you have failed to implicate a single Repub- 
lican in his Harpers Ferry enterprise. If any member 
of our party is guilty in that matter, you know it, or 
you do not know it. If you do know it, you are in- 
excusable for not designating the man and proving the 
fact. If you do not know it, you are inexcusable for 
asserting it, and especially for persisting in the assertion 
after you have tried and failed to make the proof. You 
need not be told that persisting in a charge which one 
does not know to be true, is simply malicious slander. 

Some of you admit that no Republican designedly 
aided or encouraged the Harpers Ferry affair, but still 
insist that our doctrines and declarations necessarily 
lead to such results. We do not believe it. We know 
we hold no doctrine, and make no declaration, which 
were not held to and made by "our fathers who framed 
the government under which we live." You never dealt 
fairly by us in relation to this affair. When it occurred, 
some important state elections were near at hand, and 
you were in evident glee with the belief that, by charging 
the blame upon us, you could get an advantage of us in 
those elections. The elections came, and your expectations 
were not quite fulfilled. Every Republican man knew 
that, as to himself at least, your charge w^as a slander, 
and he was not much inclined by it to cast his vote in 
your favor. Republican doctrines and declarations are 
accompanied with a continual protest against any inter- 
ference with your slaves, or with you about your slaves. 

* The John Brown raid on Harpers Ferry had occurred four 
months before this speech. He was supported by Abolitionists 
in the North, but no Republican was proved to be involved in 
the plot 



232 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Surely, this does not encourage them to revolt. True, 
we do, in common with "our fathers who framed the 
government under which' we live," declare our belief 
that slavery is wrong; but the slaves do not hear us 
declare even this. For anything we say or do, the 
slaves would scarcely know there is a Republican party. 
I believe they would not, in fact, generally know it but , 
for your misrepresentations of us in their hearing. In 
your political contests among yourselves, each faction 
charges the other with sympathy with Black Repub- 
licanism; and then, to give point to the charge, defines 
Black Republicanism to simply be insurrection, blood, 
and thunder among the slaves. 

Slave insurrections are no more common now than 
they were before the Republican party was organized. 
What induced the Southampton insurrection,* twenty- 
eight years ago, in which at least three times as many 
lives were lost as at Harpers Ferry? You can scarcely 
stretch your very elastic fanc}^ to the conclusion that 
Southampton was "got up by Black Republicanism." In 
the present state of things in the United States, I do 
not think a general, or even a very extensive, slave in- 
surrection is possible. The indispensable concert of 
action cannot be attained. The slaves have no means 
of rapid communication; nor can incendiary freemen, 
black or white, supply it. The explosive materials are 
everywhere in parcels; but there neither are, nor can 
be supplied, the indispensable connecting trains. 

Much is said by Southern people about the affection 
of slaves for their masters and mistresses ; and a part 
of it, at least, is true. A plot for an uprising could 
scarcely be devised and communicated to twenty indi- 
viduals before some one of them, to save the life of a 
favorite master or mistress, would divulge it. This is 

* The Southampton insurrection, led by Nat Turner, occurred 
in Southampton, Virginia, in 1831, and caused the death of more 
than sixty persons, nearly all of whom were women and children. 
The South regarded it as a direct result of abolitionist teachings. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 233 

the rule ; and tlie slave revolution in Haiti * was not 
an exception to it, but a case occurring under peculiar 
circumstances. The gunpowder plot of British history,f 
though not connected with slaves, was more in point. 
In that case, only about twenty were admitted to the 
secret; and yet one of them, in his anxiety to save a 
friend, betrayed the plot to that friend, and, by conse- 
quence, averted the calamity. Occasional poisonings 
from the kitchen, and open or stealthy assassinations in 
the field, and local revolts extending to a score or so, 
will continue to occur as the natural results of slavery; 
but no general insurrection of slaves, as I think, can 
happen in this country for a long time. Whoever much 
fears, or much hopes, for such an event, will be alike 
disappointed. 

In the language of Mr. Jefferson, uttered many years 
ago, "It is still in our power to direct the process of 
emancipation and deportation peaceably, and in such 
slow degrees, as that the evil will wear off insensibly; 
and their places be, pari passu,X filled up by free white 
laborers. If, on the contrary, it is left to force itself 
on, human nature must shudder at the prospect held up." 

Mr. Jefferson did not mean to say, nor do I, that the 
power of emancipation is in the federal government. He 
spoke of Virginia; and, as to the power of emancipation, 
I speak of the slaveholding states only. The federal 
government, however, as we insist, has the power of 
restraining the extension of the institution — the power 
to insure that a slave insurrection shall never occur 
on any American soil which is now free from slavery. 

John Brown's effort was peculiar. It was not a slave 
insurrection. It was an attempt by white men to get 
up a revolt among slaves, in which the slaves refused 

* The insurrection, which began in 1791, and resulted in the 
overthrow of French power. It was led by Toussaint L'Ouverture. 

t The famous Gunpowder Plot occurred in Engrland in 1604, 
when it was planned to blow up the Parliament while the king 
was present. 

% With equal step, that is, in a like degree. 



234 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

to participate. In fact, it was so absurd that the slaves, 
with all their ignorance, saw plainly enough it could 
not succeed. That affair, in its philosophy, corresponds 
with the many attempts, related in history, at the assassi- 
nation of kings and emperors. An enthusiast broods 
over the oppression of a people till he fancies himself 
commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He ventures 
the attempt, which ends in little else than his own 
execution. Orsini's attempt on Louis Napoleon,* and 
John Brown's attempt at Harpers Ferry, were, in their 
philosophy, precisely the same. The eagerness to cast 
blame on old England in the one case, and on New 
England in the other, does not disprove the sameness 
of the two things. 

And how much would it avail you, if you could, by 
the use of John Brown, Helper's book,f and the like, 
break up the Republican organization.^ Human action 
can be modified to some extent, but human nature cannot 
be changed. There is a judgment and a feeling against 
slavery in this nation, which cast at least a million and 
a half of votes. You cannot destroy that judgment and 
feeling — that sentiment — by breaking up the political 
organization which rallies around it. You can scarcely 
scatter and disperse an army which has been formed 
into order in the face of your heaviest fire; but if you 
could, how much would you gain b}'- forcing the sentiment 
which created it out of the peaceful channel of the ballot 
box into some other channel.^ What would that other 
channel probably be.^ Would the number of John 
Browns be lessened or enlarged by the operation? 

But you will break up the Union rather than submit 
to a denial of your constitutional rights. 

* Orsini was an Italian fanatic who plotted the assassination 
of Napoleon III of France in 1858. He lived in England and 
was acquitted by an Englisli jury. He was later executed in 
France. 

t Hinton Rowan Helper, a North Carolinian, had written in 
1857 The Impending Crisis in the South, designed to show the 
economic ills of the South due to slavery by a contrast with the 
free states. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 235 

That has a somewhat reckless sound; l)ut it would be 
palliated, if not fully justified, were we proposing, by 
the mere force of numbers, to deprive you of some right 
plainly written down in the Constitution. But we are 
proposing no such thing. 

When you make these declarations you have a specific 
and well-understood allusion to an assumed constitutional 
right of yours to take slaves into the federal territories, 
and to hold them there as property. But no such right 
is specifically written in the Constitution. That instru- 
ment is literally silent about any such right. We, on 
the contrary, deny that such a right has any existence 
in the Constitution, even by implication. 

Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will 
destroy the government, unless you be allowed to con- 
strue and force the Constitution as you please, on all 
points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or 
ruin in all events. 

This, plainly stated, is your language. Perhaps you 
will say the Supreme Court has decided the disputed 
constitutional question in your favor. Not quite so. 
But waiving the lawyer's distinction between dictum and 
decision, the court has decided the question for you in a 
sort of way. The court has substantially said it is your 
constitutional right to take slaves into the federal terri- 
tories, and to hold them there as property. When I 
say the decision was made in a sort of way, I mean it 
was made in a divided court, by a bare majority of the 
judges, and they not quite agreeing with one another in 
the reasons for making it; that it is so made as that 
its avowed supporters disagree with one another about 
its meaning, and that it was mainly based upon a mis- 
taken statement of fact — the statement in the opinion 
that "the right of property in a slave is distinctly and 
expressly affirmed in the Constitution." 

An inspection of the Constitution will show that the 
right of property in a slave is not "distinctly and ex- 



236 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

pressly affirmed" in it. Bear in mind, the judges do 
not pledge their judicial opinion that such right is 
impliedly affirmed in the Constitution; but they pledge 
their veracity that it is "distinctly and expressly" 
affirmed there — "distinctly," that is, not mingled with 
anything else — "expressly," that is, in words meaning 
just that, without the aid of any inference, and susceptible 
of no other meaning. 

If they had only pledged their judicial opinion that 
such right is affirmed in the instrument by implication, 
it would be open to others to show that neither the word 
"slave" nor "slavery" is to be found in the Constitution, 
nor the word "property" even, in any connection with 
language alluding to the things slave, or slavery; and 
that wherever in that instrument the slave is alluded 
to, he is called a "person" ; and wherever his master's 
legal right in relation to him is alluded to, it is spoken 
of as "service or labor which may be due" — as a debt 
payable in service or labor. Also it would be open to 
show, by contemporaneous history, that this mode of 
alluding to slaves and slavery, instead of speaking of 
them, was employed on purpose to exclude from the 
Constitution the idea that there could be property in 
man. 

To show all this is easy and certain. 

When this obvious mistake of the judges shall be 
brought to their notice, is it not reasonable to expect 
that they will withdraw the mistaken statement, and 
reconsider the conclusion based upon it? 

And then it is to be remembered that "our fathers 
who framed the government under which we live" — the 
men who made the Constitution — decided this same con- 
stitutional question in our favor long ago: decided it 
without division among themselves when making the 
decision; without division among themselves about the 
meaning of it after it was made, and, so far as any 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 237 

evidence is left, without basing it upon any mistaken 
statement of facts. 

Under all these circumstances, do you really feel your- 
selves justified to break up this government unless such 
a court decision as yours is shall be at once submitted 
to as a conclusive and final rule of political action? 
But you will not abide the election of a Republican 
President! In that supposed event, you say, you will 
destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime 
of having destroyed it will be upon us ! That is cool. A 
highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters 
through his teeth, "Stand and deliver, or I shall kill 
you, and then you will be a murderer !" 

To be sure, what the robber demanded of me — my 
money — was my own; and I had a clear right to keep 
it ; but it was no more my own than my vote is my own ; 
and the threat of death to me, to extort my money, and 
the threat of destruction to the Union, to extort my vote, 
can scarcely be distinguished in principle. 

A few words now to Republicans. It is exceedingly 
desirable that all ^^arts of this great confederacy shall 
be at peace, and in harmony one with another. Let us 
Republicans do our part to have it so. Even though 
much provoked, let us do nothing through passion and 
ill temper. Even though the Southern people will not 
so much as listen to us, let us calmly consider their 
demands, and yield to them if, in our deliberate view 
of our duty, we possibly can. Judging by all they say 
and do, and by the subject and nature of their con- 
troversy with us, let us determine, if we can, what will 
satisfy them. 

Will they be satisfied if the territories be uncondi- 
tionally surrendered to them.? We know they will not. 
In all their present complaints against us, the territories 
are scarcely mentioned. Invasions and insurrections are 
the rage now. Will it satisfy them if, in the future. 



238 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

we have nothing to do with invasions and insurrections? 
We know it will not. We so know, because we know we 
never had anything to do with invasions and insurrec- 
tions; and yet this total abstaining does not exempt us 
from the charge and the denunciation. 

The question recurs, What will satisfy them? Simply 
this : we must not only let them alone, but we must some- 
how convince them that we do let them alone. This, 
we know by experience, is no easy task. We have been 
so trying to convince them from the very beginning of 
our organization, but with no success. In all our plat- 
forms and speeches we have constantly protested our 
purpose to let them alone; but this has had no tendency 
to convince them. Alike unavailing to convince them is 
the fact that they have never detected a man of us in 
any attempt to disturb them. 

These natural and apparently adequate means all fail- 
ing, what will convince them ? This, and this only : cease 
to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. 
And this must be done thoroughly — done in acts as well 
as in words. Silence will not be tolerated — we must 
place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas's 
new sedition law * must be enacted and enforced, sup- 
pressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether 
made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, or in private. 
We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with 
greedy pleasure. We must pull down our free-state 
constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disin- 
fected from all taint of opposition to slavery, before 
they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed 
from us. 

I am quite aware they do not state their case precisely 

in this way. Most of them would probably say to us, 

"Let us alone ; do nothing to us, and say what you please 

* Senator Douglas had introduced in the Senate a resolution 
instructing- the report by the judiciary committee of a bill to 
protect each state and territory against conspiracies or combi- 
nations made in other states with the purpose of molesting the 
government, inhabitants, property, and institutions. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 239 

about slavery." But we do let them alone — have never 
disturbed them — so that, after all, it is what we say 
which dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse 
us of doing, until we cease saying. 

I am also aware they have not as yet in terms de- 
manded the overthrow of our free-state constitutions. 
Yet those constitutions declare the wrong of slavery 
with more solemn emphasis than do all other sayings 
against it; and when all these other sayings shall have 
been silenced, the overthrow of these constitutions will 
be demanded, and nothing be left to resist the demand. 
It is nothing to the contrary that they do not demand 
the whole of this just now. Demanding what they do, 
and for the reason they do, they can voluntarily stop 
nowhere short of this consummation. Holding, as they 
do, that slaverjT- is morally right and socially elevating, 
they cannot cease to demand a full national recognition 
of it as a legal right and a social blessing. 

Nor can we justifiably withhold this on any ground 
save our conviction that slavery is wrong. If slavery is 
right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it 
are themselves wrong, and should be silenced and swept 
away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its 
nationality — its universality ; if it is wrong, they cannot 
justly insist upon its extension — its enlargement. All 
they ask we could readily grant, if we thought slavery 
right; all we ask they could as readily grant, if they 
thought it wrong. Their thinking it right and our think- 
ing it wrong is the precise fact upon which depends the 
whole controversy. Thinking it right, as they do, they 
are not to blame for desiring its full recognition as being 
right; but thinking it wrong, as we do, can we yield to 
them.'* Can we cast our votes with their view, and 
against our own.^ In view of our moral, social, and 
political responsibilities, can we do this? 

Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet afford to 
let it alone where it is, because that much is due to the 



240 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

necessity arising from its actual presence in the nation; 
but can we, while our votes will prevent it, allow it to 
spread into the national territories, and to overrun us 
here in these free states? 

If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us stand by 
our duty fearlessly and effectively. Let us be diverted 
by none of those sophistical contrivances wherewith we 
are so industriously plied and belabored — contrivances 
such as groping for some middle ground between the 
right and the wrong; vain as the search for a man who 
should be neither a living man nor a dead man; such 
as a policy of "don't care" * on a question about which 
all true men do care; such as Union appeals beseeching 
true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the 
divine rule, and calling, not the sinners, but the righteous 
to repentance ;f such as invocations to Washington, im- 
ploring men to unsay what Washington said and undo 
what Washington did. 

Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false 
accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces 
of destruction to the government, nor of dungeons to 
ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might, 
and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty 
as we understand it.J 

After the Cooper Union speech Lincoln stayed in New 
York for almost a week, enjoying heartily the association with 
the leading men of the community which came to him. He 
then went to New Hampshire, where he spoke at Concord, 
Manchester, Exeter, and Dover and made a great impression. 
In Connecticut he spoke at Hartford, New Haven, Woon- 
socket, and Norwich. When he returned to Illinois he was 
at last an im])ortant national figure. 

♦ Doug-las had said he did not care whether slavery was voted 
up or voted down. 

t Matthew, ix, 13 ; Mark, ii, 17 ; Luke, v, 32. 

t This is one of the finest and most effective of Lincoln's 
phrases. 



Ill 

SAVING THE UNION 



Ill 

SAVING THE UNION 

In Illinois there had been scattered suggestions of Lincoln 
as a presidential candidate ever since 185G. His debates with 
Douglas stimulated these, and after his Cooper Union speech a 
definite movement to secure his nomination began. Lincoln 
was at first uninterested, not from lack of ambition, but from 
lack of hope. But as the movement grew, he found himself in 
the field. Regardless of whether or not he should be nomi- 
nated, he felt that he must have the support of his own state. 
As he wrote Norman B. Judd, "I am not in a position where 
it would hurt much for me to not be nominated on the national 
ticket, but I am where it would hurt some for me to not get the 
Illinois delegates." 

Nomination seemed really a hopeless thing. The East, in 
spite of the Cooper Union speech, scarcely knew him. In 
various lists of possible nominees his name was not even men- 
tioned, and where it occurred, it was usually down toward the 
bottom of the list. But on Mat 18, 1861, the Republican 
convention at Chicago nominated him on the third ballot over 
William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and 
Simon Cameron. The Democratic party in convention at 
Charleston split into two parts, the Cotton States refusing to 
accept Douglas or his platform because of the distrust they had 
formed of him on account of his Freeport interpretation of the 
Dred Scott decision.* The Northern Democrats nominated 
Douglas, and the Southern wing nominated John C. Breckin- 
ridge, the Vice President of the L^nited States. The remnant 
of the Whigs nominated John Bell of Tennessee. 

The campaign was actively carried on, but Lincoln took no 
part in it other than meeting the visitors who thronged to 
Springfield to see him. Constantly pressed to restate his 
opinions on the issues of the campaign he would reply in a form 

* Fee pag-e 170. 

243 



244 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

letter through a secretary to those he did not know. To those 
with whom he was acquainted he wrote personally. The fol- 
lowing is a typical letter of this kind: 

TO WILLIAM S. 8 PEER 

[Confidential] 

Springfield, III, October 23, 1860 
William S. Speer, Esq. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 13th was duly received. 
I appreciate your motive when you suggest the propriety 
of my writing for the public something disclaiming all 
intention to interfere with slaves or slavery in the 
states; but in my judgment it would do no good. I have 
already done this many, many times ; and it is in print, 
and open to all who will read. Those who will not read 
or heed what I have already publicly said would not 
read or heed a repetition of it. "li they hear not Moses 
and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though 
one rose from the dead." *' 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Lincoln watched the progress of the campaign with the 
normal interest of a candidate. He did not at all believe the 
assurance which had been given by Southern leaders since 1856 
that the election of a sectional President would be followed bj'' 
the secession of the Southern states, so as yet he did not 
realize that the task of his presidency would be the preserva- 
tion of the Union of the states. Nor did the North have any 
conception of what would be the result of his election. He 
was growing in the estimation of the country, but the vast 
majority, even of the Republicans, thought his nomination had 
been one purely of expediency and that there were men in the 
party far better qualified to be President. 

The election resulted in the choice of Lincoln, the electoral 
vote standing: Lincoln, 180; Breckinridge, 72; Bell, 39; and 
Douglas, 12. The popular vote stood: Lincoln, 1,857,610; 

* Luke xvi, 21. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 245 

Douglas, 1,291,574; Breckinridge, 850,082; and Bell, 646,134. 
He thus had against him nearly a million majority of the 
voters, and in ten states he had received not a single vote. 

Soon after his election he began to make up his cabinet. 
The most interesting letter on the subject was to William H. 
Seward. 

TO WTLLIAM H. SEWARD 

Springfield, 111., December 8, 1860 
My dear Sir: With your permission I shall at the 
proper time nominate you to the Senate for confirmation 
as Secretary of State for the United States. Please let 
me hear from you at your own earliest convenience. 
Your friend and obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 

TO WILLIAM H. SEWARD 
[Private and Confidential] 

My dear Sir: In addition to the accompanying and 
more formal note inviting you to take charge of the 
State Department, I deem it proper to address you this. 
Rumors have got into the newspapers to the effect that 
the department named above would be tendered you as 
a compliment, and with the expectation that you would 
decline it. I beg you to be assured that I have said 
nothing to justify these rumors. On the contrary, it 
has been my purpose, from the day of the nomination at 
Chicago, to assign you, by your leave, this place in the 
administration. I have delayed so long to communicate 
that purpose in deference to what appeared to me a 
proper caution in the case. Nothing has been developed 
to change my view in the premises ; and I now offer you 
the place in the hope that you will accept it, and with 
the belief that your position in the public eye, your 
integrity, ability, learning, and great experience, all 
combine to render it an appointment preeminently fit to 
be mnde. 



246 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

One word more. In regard to the patronage sought 
with so much eagerness and jealousy, I have prescribed 
for myself the maxim, "Justice to all"; and I earnestly 
beseech your cooperation in keeping the maxim good. 
Your friend and obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 
Hon'. William H. Seward, Washington, D. C. 

Lincoln was anxious to select a Southern man for a place 
in the cabinet, and considered a number of names. Among 
these was that of John A. Gilmer, a leading North Carolina 
Whig, who was a member of Congress. He asked him to 
come to Springfield for an interview, but Giilmer did nbt care 
to commit himself thus far and wrote asking information as to 
Lincoln's position on a number of questions. Lincoln thus 
replied : 

TO JOHN A. GILMER 

[Strictly confidential] 

Springfield, 111., December 15, 1860 
Hon. John A. Gilmer. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 10th is received. I am 
greatly disinclined to write a letter on the subject em- 
braced in yours ; and I would not do so, even privately 
as I do, were it not that I fear you might misconstrue 
my silence. Is it desired that I shall shift the ground 
upon which I have been elected? I cannot do it. You 
need only to acquaint yourself with that ground, and 
press it on the attention of the South. It is all in print 
and easy of access. May I be pardoned if I ask whether 
even you have ever attempted to procure the reading of 
the Republican platform, or my speeches, by the Southern 
people.^ If not, what reason have I to expect that any 
additional production of mine would meet a better fate.^* 
It would make me appear as if I repented for the crime 
of having been elected, and was anxious to apologize and 
beg forgiveness. To so represent me would be the prin- 
cipal use made of any letter I might now thrust upon 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 247 

the public. My old record cannot be so used; and that 
is precisely the reason that some new declaration is so 
much sought. 

Now, my dear sir, be assured that I am not question- 
ing your candor; I am only pointing out that while a 
new letter would hurt the cause which I think a just 
one, you can quite as well effect every patriotic object 
with the old record. Carefully read pages 18, 19, 74, 
75, 88, 89, and 267 of the volume of joint debates be- 
tween Senator Douglas and myself, with the Republican 
platform adopted at Chicago, and all your questions will 
be substantially answered. I have no thought of recom- 
mending the abolition of slavery in the District of 
Columbia, nor the slave-trade among the slave states, 
even on the conditions indicated; and if I were to make 
such recommendation, it is quite clear Congress would 
not follow it. 

As to employing slaves in arsenals and dock-yards, it 
is a thing I never thought of in my life, to my recol- 
lection, till I saw your letter; and I may say of it 
precisely as I have said of the two points above. 

As to the use of patronage in the slave states, where 
there are few or no Republicans, I do not expect to 
inquire for the politics of the appointee, or whether he 
does or does not own slaves. I intend in that matter to 
accommodate the people in the several localities, if they 
themselves will allow me to accommodate them. In one 
word, I never have been, am not now, and probably 
never shall be in a mood of harassing the people either 
North or South. 

On the territorial question I am inflexible, as you see 
my position in the book. On that there is a difference 
between you and us ; and it is the only substantial differ- 
ence. You think slavery is right and ought to be ex- 
tended ; we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. 
For this neither has any just occasion to be angry with 
the other. 



248 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

As to the state laws, mentioned in your sixth question, 
I really know very little of them. I never have read one. 
If any of them" are in conflict with the fugitive-slave 
clause, or any other part of the Constitution, I certainly 
shall be glad of their repeal ; but I could hardly be 
justified, as a citizen of Illinois, or as President of the 
United States, to recommend the repeal of a statute of 
Vermont or South Carolina.^ 

With the assurance of my highest regards, I subscribe 
myself. 

Your obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 

P. S. — The documents referred to I suppose you will 
readily find in Washington. A. L. 

It became evident soon after the results of the election 
were known that the Southern leaders had been entirely in 
earnest in their announcement of the intention of the Southern 
states to withdraw from the Union. South Carolina still chose 
her presidential electors through the legislature, which met on 
election day for that purpose. Instead of adjourning as usual 
the legislature had remained in session, and as soon as Lin- 
coln's election was certain, had called a convention of the 
people to meet in December. On December 20 this convention 
passed an ordinance of secession, which was in form merely 
the repeal of the ordinance of 1788 by which the state had rati- 
fied the Constitution of the United States and entered the 
Union. Her example was followed by Mississippi, Florida, 
Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. In February, 1861, 
delegates from these states, meeting in Montgomery, Alabama, 
formed a new government, called the Confederate States of 
America, and elected Jefferson Davis President, and Alexander 
H. Stephens Vice President. 

Under the view of the Constitution and the nature of the 

* In this reference to the personal liberty laws of the Northern 
states, passed to hinder the execution of the Fugitive Slave Law. 
Lincoln ignored a deep-seated cause of the Southern belief that 
the North was not willing to grant th-m their constitutional 
rights. He does this by a clever application of state rights 
doctrine which, clever as it was, was more worthy of the poli- 
tician than the statesman. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 249 

Union which generally prevailed in the South at this time, the 
withdrawal of these states was an exercise of an undoubted 
right. When the Constitution of the United States was 
adopted, almost all the states which ratified it had already a 
longer history of separate existence than the time which had 
elapsed from then until 1861. Each had its own laws and 
institutions; each was intolerant of outside power. They had 
come together in the Revolution under the pressure of a com- 
mon need, but they had refused even then to consent to any 
stronger tie than was to be found in the weak Articles of 
Confederation, by which each state retained its "sovereignty, 
freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and 
right" not expressly delegated to the United States. The 
weakness of the government under the Articles became appar- 
ent, and a convention, composed of delegates from the states, 
adopted the Constitution, which was ratified by the states, 
North Carolina and Rhode Island declining at first to ratify 
and remaining as separate states for a time. If the Constitu- 
tion had forbidden withdrawal, it is not likely that any of the 
states would have ratified it. As it was, New York, Rhode 
Island, and Virginia, at the time of ratification, stated their 
right to withdraw, Virginia declaring "that the powers granted 
under the Constitution, being truly derived from the people of 
the United States, may be resumed by them whenever the 
same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression." No- 
body questioned the right. As Mr. Henry Cabot Lodge says, 

"When the Constitution was adopted by the votes of the 
states in convention at Philadelphia, and accepted by the votes 
of the states in popular convention, it is safe to say there was 
not a man in the country, from Washington and Hamilton on 
the one side, to George Clinton and George Mason on the 
other, who regarded the new system as anything but an experi- 
ment entered upon by the states and from which each and 
every state had the right peaceably to \vithdraw, a right which 
was very likely to be exercised." 

Secession, as a possibility, had been accepted from the 
beginning. New England, with Massachusetts as a leader, had 
often threatened it. But as time passed, the political theory 
of the North began to change, and an increasing number of 
the people denied the right. The rise of manufacturing, the 



250 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

increasing flood of immigration, the absence of slavery as a 
peculiar institution which had to be protected against the 
hostility of a majority, all contributed to allow the growth of 
national feeling. Not the least important element in the 
development of national feeling was the rise of the West. 
Every western state had been made by the Union and had 
little or no history apart from it. The North and the South 
talked of secession and such states as Massachusetts and Vir- 
ginia were proudly conscious of their noble history as indi- 
vidual entities, but the great West, with its face to the future, 
thought only in terms of the Union and claimed the glories of 
all the states as the common heritage of all Americans. 

When the Cotton states seceded, public opinion in the 
North was divided in opinion as to the proper course to pur- 
sue. Many people favored peaceable separation. General 
Scott phrasing a common opinion when he said, "Let the way- 
ward sisters depart in peace." Horace Greeley held this view 
also. 

South Carolina, and later the Confederacy, through com- 
missioners, sought to negotiate with the Buchanan administra- 
tion for the surrender of Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor 
and of Fort Pickens below Pensacola. All these attempts 
failed, as Buchanan declined to receive ihem officially or un- 
officially. In his annual message. President Buchanan denied 
the right of secession, but declared that Congress had not 
given the President the power to enforce the laws against state 
action and that there was no power under the Constitution for 
the coercion of a state. Both North and South then settled 
down to wait for something to happen. Buchanan has been 
harshly criticized for his failure to act, but the division of 
sentiment alluded to would have probably prevented his receiv- 
ing the support of the country in any active measure. It is 
well to remember, too, that Lincoln followed for a month 
substantially the same policy of waiting. 

The truth of the whole matter was that the country looked 
to compromise for a settlement, and several attempts at com- 
promise were made. To any compromise that involved the 
surrender of the fundamental Republican doctrine of oppo- 
sition to the extension of slavery, Lincoln was steadfastly 
opposed and made known his opposition. The following let- 
ter sets forth this position: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 251 

TO THURLOW WEED 

Springfield, 111., December 17, 1860 
Thiirlow Weed, Esq. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 11th was received two 
days ago. Should the convocation of governors of which 
you speak seem desirous to know my views on the present 
aspect of things, tell them you judge from my speeches 
that I will be inflexible on the territorial question; that 
I probably think either the Missouri line extended, or 
Douglas's and Eli Thayer's popular sovereignty, would 
lose us everything we gain by the election; that filibus- 
tering for all south of us and making slave states of it 
would follow, in spite of us, in either case; also that I 
probably think all opposition, real and apparent, to the 
fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution ought to be 
withdrawn. 

I believe you can pretend to find but little, if anything, 
in my speeches about secession. But my opinion is that 
no state can in any way lawfully get out of the Union 
without the consent of the others; and that it is the 
duty of the President and other government functionaries 
to run the machine as it is. 

Truly yours, 

A. Lincoln 

By his letters of this period it is clear that these were 
Lincoln's views on the immediate issues before the country: 

Slavery is wrong and must not be extended. 

No proposition for the extension of slavery must be even 
entertained. 

No state can in any way lawfully get out of the Union, 
without the consent of the others. It is the duty of the 
President and the other government functionaries to run the 
machine as it is. 

If the Southern forts still in the possession of the United 
States fall, they must be retaken. 

With these views settled in his mind he came to the presi- 
dency. 



252 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

When the time came to start for Washington, Lincoln bade 
farewell to his Springfield friends, many of whom he was not 
to see again, in these simple words: 

FAREWELL ADDRESS AT SPRINGFIELD 
[February 11, 1861] 

My Friends : No one^ not in my situation, can appre- 
ciate my feeling of sadness at this parting. To this place, 
and the kindness of these people, I owe everything. 
Here I have lived a quarter of a century, and have 
passed from a young to an old man. Here my children 
have been born, and one is buried. I now leave, not 
knowing when or whether ever I may return, with a 
task before me greater than that which rested upon 
Washington. Without the assistance of that Divine 
Being who ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With 
that assistance, I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who 
can go with me, and remain with you, and be everywhere 
for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be welL 
To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers 
you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell. 

On the way to Washington he made short addresses at 
Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Buf- 
falo, Albany, New York, Philadelphia, and Harrisburg. The 
most notable of these was the address delivered in Independ- 
ence Hall on February 22. j 

ADDRESS IN INDEPENDENCE HALL, 
PHILADELPHIA 

[February 22, 1861] 

Mr. Cuyler: I am filled with deep emotion at find- 
ing myself standing in this place, where were collected 
together the wisdom, the patriotism, the devotion to 
principle, from which sprang the institutions under 
which we live. You have kindly suggested to me that •' 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 253 

in my hands is the task of restoring peace to our dis- 
tracted country. I can say in return^ sir, that all the 
political sentiments I entertain have been drawn, so far 
as I have been able to draw them, from the sentiments 
which originated in and were given to the world from 
this hall. I have never had a feeling, politically, that 
did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the 
Declaration of Independence. I have often pondered 
over the dangers which were incurred by the men who 
assembled here and framed and adopted that Declara- 
tion. I have pondered over the toils that were endured 
by the officers and soldiers of the army who achieved 
that independence. I have often inquired of myself 
what great principle or idea it was that kept this Con- 
federacy so long together. It was not the mere matter 
of separation of the colonies from the motherland, but 
that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which 
gave liberty not alone to the people of this country, but 
hope to all the world, for all future time. It was that 
which gave promise that in due time the weights would 
be lifted from the shoulders of all men, and that all 
should have an equal chance. This is the sentiment em- 
bodied in the Declaration of Independence. Now, my 
friends, can this country be saved on that basis .^ If it 
can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in 
the world if I can help to save it. If it cannot be saved 
upon that principle, it will be truly awful. But if this 
country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, 
I was about to say I would rather be assassinated on this 
spot than surrender it. Now, in my view of the present 
aspect of affairs, there is no need of bloodshed and war. 
There is no necessity for it. I am not in favor of such 
a course; and I may say in advance that there will be 
no bloodshed unless it is forced upon the government. 
The government will not use force, unless force is used 
against it. 

My friends, tliis is wholly an I'nprepared speech. I 



254 SELECTIONS FKOM LINCOLN 

did not expect to be called on to say a word when I 
came here. I supposed I was merely to do something 
toward raising a flag. I may, therefore, have said some- 
thing indiscreet. But I have said nothing but what I 
am willing to live by, and, if it be the pleasure of 
Almighty God, to die by. 

Lincoln was inaugurated on March 4, 1861, in accordance 
with custom, upon the east portico of the Capitol. Among 
those present were Stephen A. Douglas, one of his unsuccess- 
ful opponents, who held his hat while he delivered his inaugural 
address, Roger B. Taney, who as Chief Justice of the United 
States administered the oath of office, former President F'rank- 
lin Pierce, and the outgoing President, James Buchanan, the 
"Stephen, Roger, Franklin, and James" of his Springfield 
speech.* 

The inaugural had been prepared in Springfield in January 
and had later been submitted to Seward for comment. The 
latter made certain suggestions which Lincoln accepted. It 
made, at the time of its delivery, no profound impression. 
Many Republicans were disappointed, and Lincoln's political 
opponents found little in it to approve. The New York Herald 
said of it, "It is not a crude performance, it abounds in traits 
of craft and cunning, it is neither candid nor statesmanlike, 
nor does it possess any essential of dignity or patriotism. It 
would have caused a Washington to mourn, and would have 
inspired Jefferson, Madison, or Jackson, with contempt.'' As 
time passed, however, men began to see under its calm pleading 
language a firm determination to preserve the Union at any 
hazard. Even at the time its evident sincerity struck deeply 
those who heard it delivered. Horace Greeley said, "The man 
evidently believed with all his soul that if he could but con- 
vince the South that he would arrest and return her fugitive 
slaves, and offered slavery every support required by comity 
or by the letter of the Constitution, he would avert her hos- 
tility — dissolve the Confederacy, and restore throughout the 
Union the sway of the federal authority." 

Today the inaugural ranks high among lincoln's addresses 
for the literary excellence of its simple, direct, and dignified 
words. 

♦ See page 164. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 255 

FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS 
[March 4, 1861] 

Fellow Citizens of the United Stx\tes: In com- 
pliance with a custom as old as the government itself, 
I appear before you to address you briefly, and to take 
in your presence the oath prescribed by the Constitution 
of the United States to be taken by the President "before 
he enters on the execution of his office." 

I do not consider it necessary at present for me to 
discuss those matters of administration about which there 
is no special anxiety or excitement. 

Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the 
Southern states that by the accession of a Republican 
administration their property and their peace and per- 
sonal security are to be endangered. There has never 
been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. In- 
deed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all 
the while existed and been open to their inspection. It 
is found in nearly all the published speeches of him 
who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of 
those speeches when I declare that "I have no purpose, 
directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution 
of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have 
no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to 
do so." Those who nominated and elected me did so 
with full knowledge that I had made this and many 
similar declarations, and had never recanted them. And, 
more than this, they placed in the platform for my 
acceptance, and as a law to themselves and to me, the 
clear and emphatic resolution which I now read: 

^'Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights 
of the states, and especially the right of each state to 
order and control its own domestic institutions according 
to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that 
balance of power on which the perfection nnd etidiirance 



256 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of our political fabric depend^ and we denounce the law- 
less invasion by armed force of the soil of any state or 
territory, no matter under what pretext, as among the 
gravest of crimes." 

I now reiterate these sentiments; and, in doing so, I 
only press upon the public attention the most conclusive 
evidence of which the case is susceptible, that the prop- 
erty, peace, and security of no section are to be in any 
wise endangered by the now incoming administration. 
I add, too, that all the protection which, consistently 
with the Constitution and the laws, can be given, will 
be cheerfully given to all the states when lawfully de- 
manded, for whatever cause — as cheerfully to one sec- 
tion as to another. 

There is much controversy about the delivering up of 
fugitives from service or labor. The clause I now read 
is as plainly written in the Constitution as any other of 
its provisions: 

"No person held to service or labor in one state, under 
the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall in conse- 
quence of any law or regulation therein be discharged 
from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on 
claim of the party to whom such service or labor may 
be due." 

It is scarcely questioned that this provision was in- 
tended by those who made it for the reclaiming of what 
we call fugitive slaves ; and the intention of the law- 
giver is the law. All members of Congress swear their 
support to the whole Constitution — to this provision as 
much as to any other. To the proposition, then, that 
slaves whose cases come within the terms of this clause 
"shall be delivered up," their oaths are unanimous. 
Now, if they would make the effort in good temper, 
could they not with nearly equal unanimity frame and 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 257 

pass a law by means of which to keep good that unani- 
mous oath? 

There is some difference of opinion whether this clause- 
should be enforced by national or by state authority; 
but surely that difference is not a very material one. 
If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be of but little 
consequence to him or to others by which authority it 
is done. And should anyone in any case be content that 
his oath shall go unkept on a merely unsubstantial con- 
troversy as to how it shall be kept? 

Again, in any law upon this subject, ought not all the 
safeguards of liberty known in civilized and humane 
jurisprudence to be introduced, so that a free man be 
not, in any case, surrendered as a slave? And might 
it not be well at the same time to provide by law for 
the enforcement of that clause in the Constitution whicli 
guarantees that "the citizen of each state shall be en- 
titled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the 
several states"? 

I take the official oath today with no mental reserva- 
tions, and with no purpose to construe the Constitution 
or laws by any hypercritical rules. And while I do not 
choose now to specify particular acts of Congress as 
proper to be enforced, I do suggest that it will be much 
safer for all, both in official and private stations, to 
conform to and abide by all those acts which stand un- 
repealed, than to violate any of them, trusting to find 
impunity in having them held to be unconstitutional. 

It is seventy-two years since the first inauguration of 
•I president under our national Constitution. During 
that period fifteen different and greatly distinguished 
citizens have, in succession, administered the executive 
branch of the government. They have conducted it 
through many perils, and generally with great success. 
Yet, with all this scope of precedent, I now enter upon 
the same task for the brief constitutional term of four 



258 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

years under great and peculiar difficulty. A disruption 
of the federal Union, heretofore only menaced,^ is now 
formidably attempted. 

I hold that, in contemplation of universal law and of 
the Constitution, the union of these states is perpetual. 
Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the funda- 
mental law of all national governments. It is safe to 
assert that no government proper ever had a provision 
in its organic law for its own termination. Continue to 
execute all the express provisions of our national Con- 
stitution, and the Union will endure forever — it being 
Impossible to destroy it except by some action not pro- 
vided for in the instrument itself. 

Again, if the United States be not a government 
proper, but an association of states in the nature of 
contract merely, can it, as a contract, be peaceably un- 
made by less than all the parties who made it.^ One 
party to a contract may violate it — break it, so to speak; 
but does it not require all to lawfully rescind it.'^ 

Descending from these general principles, we find the 
proposition that in legal contemplation the Union is 
perpetual confirmed by the history of the Union itself. 
The Union is much older than the Constitution. It was 
formed, in fact, by the Articles of Association in 1774. 
It was matured and continued by the Declaration of 
Independence in 1776. It was further matured, and 
the faith of all the then thirteen states expressly plighted 
and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the Articles 
of Confederation in 1778. And, finally, in 1787 one 
of the declared objects for ordaining and establishing 
the Constitution was "to form a more perfect Union." 

But if the destruction of the Union by one or by a 
part only of the states be lawfully possible, the Union 

* The reference is to the persistence of secession in New Eng- 
land from 1801 to its culmination in the Hartford Convention 
of 1814, to nullification in South Carolina in 1832, and to the 
threat of South Carolina and other Southern states at the time 
of the compromise of 1850. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 259 

is less perfect than before the Constitution, having lost 
the vital element of perpetuity.* 

It follows from these views that no state upon its own 
mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; that 
resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void; 
and that acts of violence, within any state or states, 
against the authority of the United States, are insur- 
rectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances. f 

I therefore consider that, in view of the Constitution 
and the laws, the Union is unbroken ; and to the extent 
of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself 
expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union 
be faithfully executed in all the states. Doing this I 
deem to be only a simple duty on my part; and I shall 
perform it so far as practicable, unless my rightful 
masters, the American people, shall withhold the requisite 
means, or in some authoritative manner direct the con- 
trary. I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but 
only as the declared purpose of the Union that it will 
constitutionally defend and maintain itself. 

In doing this there needs to be no bloodshed or vio- 
lence ; and there shall be none, unless it be forced upon 
the national authority. The power confided to me will 
be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and 
places belonging to the government, and to collect the 
duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary 
for these objects, there will be no invasion, no using 
of force against or among the people anywhere. Where 
hostility to the United States, in anj^ interior locality, 
shall be so great and universal as to prevent competent 

* Lincoln here speaks as the representative of the West, which 
had never held any doctrine of state sovereignty. He ignores 
opinions of the right of secession such as Hamilton expressed at 
the time of the adoption of the Constitution. A similar historical 
view is that of Lodge quoted on page 249. Scarcely anywhere 
prior to 1860 was the right seriously questioned in the thirteen 
original states. 

t Lincoln here states first his doctrine of the indestructibility 
of the Union on which he was to fight the war and plan recon- 
struction. 



260 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

resident citizens from holding the federal offices^ there 
will be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers among 
the people for that object. While the strict legal right 
may exist in the government to enforce the exercise of 
these offices, the attempt to do so would be so irritating, 
and so nearly impracticable withal, that I deem it better 
to forego for the time the uses of such offices. 

The mails, unless repelled, will continue to be furnished 
in all parts of the Union. So far as possible, the people 
everywhere shall have that sense of perfect security 
which is most favorable to calm thought and reflection. 
The course here indicated will be followed unless current 
events and experience shall show a modification or change 
to be proper, and in every case and exigency my best 
discretion will be exercised according to circumstances 
actually existing, and with a view and a hope of a peace- 
ful solution of the national troubles and the restoration of 
fraternal sympathies and affections. 

That there are persons in one section or another who 
seek to destroy the Union at all events, and are glad of 
any pretext to do it, I will neither affirm nor deny; but 
if there be such, I need address no word to them. To 
those, however, who really love the Union may I not 
speak ? 

Before entering upon so grave a matter as the destruc- 
tion of our national fabric, with all its benefits, its memo- 
ries, and its hopes, would it not be wise to ascertain 
precisely why we do it? Will you hazard so desperate a 
step while there is any possibility that any portion of the 
ills you fly from* have no real existence ? Will you, while 
the certain ills you fly to are greater than all the real ones 
you fly from — will you risk the commission of so fearful 
a mistake? 

All profess to be content in the Union if all constitu- 
tional rights can be maintained. Is it true, then, that any 
right, plainly written in the Constitution, has been 

* Hamlet, Act iii, Scene i. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 261 

denied? I think not. Happily the human mind is so 
constituted that no party can reach to the audacity of 
doing this. Think, if you can, of a single instance in 
which a plainly written provision of the Constitution 
has ever been denied. If by the mere force of numbers 
a maj ority should deprive a minority of any clearly writ- 
ten constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of 
view, justify revolution — certainly would if such a right 
were a vital one. But such is not our case. All the vital 
rights of minorities and of individuals are so plainly 
assured to them by affirmations and negations, guaranties 
and prohibitions, in the Constitution, that controversies 
never arise concerning them. But no organic law can 
ever be framed with a provision specifically applicable 
to every question which may occur in practical adminis- 
tration. No foresight can anticipate, nor any document 
of reasonable length contain, express provisions for all 
possible questions. Shall fugitives " from labor be sur- 
rendered by national or by state authority ? The Consti- 
tution does not expressly say. May Congress prohibit 
slavery in the territories .f* The Constitution does not 
expressly say. Miist Congress protect slavery in the 
territories? The Constitution does not expressly say.* 

From questions of this class spring all our constitu- 
tional controversies, and we divide upon them into 
majorities and minorities. If the minority will not 
acquiesce, the majority must, or the government must 
cease. There is no other alternative ; for continuing the 
government is acquiescence on one side or the other. 

If a minority in such case will secede rather than 

acquiesce, they make a precedent which in turn will divide 

and ruin them; for a minority of their own will secede 

from them whenever a majority refuses to be controlled 

by such minority. For instance,' why may not any portion 

of a new confederacy a year or two hence arbitrarily 

* Lincoln fails to discuss here the personal liberty laws or 
the insistent refusal of the North to accept the Dred Scott 
decision, both grave causes of Southern dissatisfaction. 



262 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

secede a^ain, precisely as portions of the present Union 
now claim to secede from it? All who cherish disunion 
sentiments are now being educated to the exact temper 
of doing this. 

Is there such perfect identity of interests among the 
states to compose a new Union, as to produce harmony 
only, and prevent renewed secession? 

Plainly, the central idea of secession is the essence of 
anarchy. A majority held in restraint by constitutional 
checks and limitations, and always changing easily with 
deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, 
is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever 
rejects it does, of necessity, fly to anarchy or to despot- 
ism. Unanimity is impossible; the rule of a minority, as a 
permanent arrangement, is wholly inadmissible; so that, 
rejecting the majority principle, anarchy or despotism 
in some form is all that is left.* 

I do not forget the position, assumed by some, that 
constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme 
Court; nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding, 
in any case, upon the parties to a suit, as to the object 
of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high 
respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other 
departments of the government. And while it is obviously 
possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given 
case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to 
that particular case, with the chance that it may be over- 
ruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can 
Letter be borne than could the evils of a different practice. 
At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that 
if the policy of the government, upon vital questions 
affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by 
decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant thiey are 
made, in ordinary litigation between parties in personal 
actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, 
having to that extent jjractically resigned their govern- 

* This is a sr>!endM statement of the fiinrlamental principle 
on which majority I'ule in govei'nment is based. 



\ 



Sl^LECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 263 

ment into the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor is 
there in this view any assault upon the court or the 
judges. It is a duty from which they may not shrink 
to decide cases pro2:)erly brought before them^ and it is 
no fault of theirs if others seek to turn their decisions 
to political purposes. 

One section of our country believes slavery is right, 
and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is 
wrong, and ought not to be extended. This is the only 
substantial dispute. The fugitive-slave clause of the 
Constitution, and the law for the suppression of the 
foreign slave-trade, are each as well enforced, perhaps, 
as any law can ever be in a community where the moral 
sense of the people imperfectly supports the law itself. 
The great body of the people abide by the dry legal 
obligation in both cases, and a few break over in each. 
This, I think^ cannot be perfectly cured ; and it would be 
worse in both cases after the separation of the sections 
than before. The foreign slave-trade, now imperfectly 
suppressed, would be ultimately revived, without restric- 
tion, in one section, while fugitive slaves, now only 
partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at all 
by the other.* 

Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot 
remove our respective sections from each other, nor build 
an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife 
may be divorced, and go out of the presence and beyond 
the reach of each other; but the different parts of our 
country cannot do this. They cannot but remain face to 
face, and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must 
continue between them. Is it possible, then, to make 
that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory 
after separation than before.^ Can aliens make treaties 
easier than friends can make laws? Can treaties be 

* Lincoln constantly asserted that secession would be followed 
by the reopening- of the African slave trade. But the Confed- 
erate constitution forbade its reopening, and there was little or 
no sentiment in the South in favor of such action. 



264 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can 
among friends ? Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight 
always ; and when, after much loss on both sides, and 
no gain on either, you cease fighting, the identical old 
questions as to terms of intercourse are again upon you. 

This country, with its institutions, belongs to the 
people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary 
of the existing government, they can exercise their con- 
stitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary 
right to dismember or overthrow it. I cannot be ignorant 
of the fact that many worthy and patriotic citizens are 
desirous of having the national Constitution amended. 
While I make no recommendation of amendments, I fully 
recognize the rightful authority of the people over the 
whole subject, to be exercised in either of the modes 
prescribed in the instrument itself; and I should, under 
existing circumstances, favor rather than oppose a fair 
opportunity being afforded the people to act upon it. I 
will venture to add that to me the convention mode seems 
preferable, in that it allows amendments to originate 
with the people themselves, instead of only permitting 
them to take or reject propositions originated by others 
not especially chosen for the purpose, and which might 
not be precisely such as they would wish to either accept 
or refuse. I understand a proposed amendment to the 
Constitution — which amendment, however, I have not 
seen — has passed Congress, to the effect that the federal 
government shall never interfere with the domestic insti- 
tutions of the states, including that of persons held to 
service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, 
I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular 
amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provi- 
sion to now be implied constitutional law, I have no 
objection to its being made express and irrevocable. 

The chief magistrate derives all his authority from the 
people, and they have conferred none upon him to fix 
terms for the separation of the states. The people them- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 265 

selves can do this also if tliey choose; but the Executive, 
as such, has nothing to do with it. His duty is to admin- 
ister the present government, as it came to his hands, and 
to transmit it, unimpaired by him, to his successor. 

Why should there not be a patient confidence in the 
ultimate justice of the people.^ Is there any better or 
equal hope in the world? In our present differences is 
either party without faith of being in the right? If the 
Almighty Ruler of Nations, with His eternal truth and 
justice, be on your side of the North, or on yours of the 
South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail 
by the judgment of this great tribunal of the American 
people. 

By the frame of the government under which we live, 
this same people have wisely given their public servants 
but little power for mischief; and have, with equal w^is- 
dom, provided for the return of that little to their own 
hands at very short intervals. While the people retain 
their virtue and vigilance, no administration, by any 
extreme of wickedness or folly, can very seriously injure 
the government in the short space of four years. 

My countrymen, one and all, think calmly and well 
upon this whole subject. Nothing valuable can be lost 
by taking time. If there be an object to hurry any of 
you in hot haste to a step which you would never take 
deliberately, that object will be frustrated by taking 
time; but no good object can be frustrated by it. Such 
of you as are now dissatisfied, still have the old Consti- 
tution unimpaired, and, on the sensitive point, the laws 
of your own framing under it ; while the new administra- 
tion will have no immediate power, if it would, to change 
either. If it were admitted that you who are dissatisfied 
hold the right side in the dispute, there still is no single 
good reason for precipitate action. Intelligence, patriot- 
ism, Christianity, and a firm reliance on Him who has 
never yet forsaken this favored land, are still competent 
to adjust in the best way all our present difficulty. 



266 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and 
not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The 
government will not assail you. You can have no conflict 
without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no 
oath registered in heaven to destroy the government, while 
I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, 
and defend it."* 

I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. 
We must not be enemies. Though passion may have 
strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The 
mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle- 
field and patriot grave to every living heart and hearth- 
stone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus 
of the Union when again touched, as surely they will 
be, by the better angels of our nature. f 

Immediately after his inauguration Lincoln was over- 
whelmed by the throng of office seekers that attend any new 
administration, particularly large at this time because a new 
party was coming into power. To them he was compelled to 
give the major part of his time, regardless of the crisis in the 
affairs of the nation. So far as the South was concerned, he 
submitted to the cabinet the question of whether it was polit- 
ically advisable to relieve Fort Sumter. Five answered that 
it was not. He himself was quite uncertain what to do. He 
thought it all-important to save to the Union the Border slave 
states which had not seceded, and so he did what Buchanan 
had done — let things drift for the time being. 

There was much criticism like that of General John A. 
Dix, "When I left Washington Saturday last (March 33) I 
do not think the administration had any settled policy. It was 
merely drifting with the current, at a loss to know whether it 
were better to come to anchor or set sail." 

♦Constitution. Art. 2. Sec. 1, 8. 

t Seward suggested the last paragraph of the address. He 
wrote it, "T close. We are not, we must not be, aliens or 
enemies, but fellow-countrymen and brethren. Although passion 
may have strained our bonds of affection too hardly, they must 
not, I am sure they will not, be broken. The mystic chords 
which, proceeding from so many battlefields and so many patriot 
graves, pass through all the hearts and hearths in this broad 
continent of ours, will yet again harmonize in their ancient music 
when breathed upon by the guardian argel of the nation." 
Contrast the two statements of the same idea. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 267 

In the meantime Secretary Seward, on his own account, was 
in communication with the Confederate commissioners through 
Justice John A. Campbell of the Supreme Court, and was 
assuring them that it was almost certain that Fort Sumter 
would be evacuated. He had accepted the post of Secretary 
of State with the firm conviction that he would save the coun- 
try. As he wrote his wife on the day he accepted the appoint- 
ment, "I will try to save freedom and my country." On an- 
other occasion he wrote, "I know that I can save the country, 
and I know no other man can." He believed in all sincerity 
and honesty that Lincoln was unable to save the situation and 
on April 1, wrote the following remarkable note: 

"some thoughts for the president's consideration 

"First. We are at the end of a month's administration, and 
yet without a policy either domestic or foreign. 

"Second. This, however, is not culpable, and it has even 
been unavoidable. The presence of the Senate, with the need 
to meet applications for patronage, have prevented attention to 
other and. more grave matters. 

"Third. But further delay to adopt and prosecute our 
policies for both domestic and foreign affairs would not only 
bring scandal on the administration, but danger upon the 
country. 

"Fourth. To do this we must dismiss the applicants for 
office. But how? I suggest that we make the local appoint- 
ments fortliwith, leaving foreign or general ones for ulterior 
and occasional action. 

"Fifth. The policy at home. I am aware that my views are 
singular, and perhaps not sufficiently explained. My system is 
built upon this idea as a ruling one, namely, that we' must 

"Change the question before the pvblic from one upon 
slavery, or aboiit slavery, for a question upon union or disunion: 

"In other words, from M'hat would be regarded as a party 
question, to one of patriotism or union. 

"The occupation or evacuation of Fort Sumter, although 
not in fact a slavery or a party question, is so regarded. Wit- 
ness the temper manifested by the Republicans in the free 
states, and even by the Union men in the South. 

"I would therefore terminate it as a safe means for chang- 
ing the issue. I deem it fortunate that the last administration 
created the necessity. 

"For the rest, I would simultaneously defend and reenforce 
all the ports in the gulf, and have the na\y recalled from 



268 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

foreign stations to be prepared for a blockade. Put the island 
of Key West under martial law. 

"This will raise distinctly the question of union or disunion. 
I would maintain every fort and possession in the South. 

For Foreign Nations 

"I would demand explanations from Spain and France, 
categorically, at once. 

"I would seek explanations from Great Britain and Russia, 
and send agents into Canada, Mexico, and Central America to 
rouse a vigorous continental spirit of independence on this 
continent against European intervention.* 

"And, if satisfactory explanations are not received from 
Spain and France, would convene Congress and declare war 
against them. 

"But whatever policy we adopt, there must be energetic 
prosecution of it. 

"For this purpose it must be somebody's business to pursue 
and direct it incessantly. 

"Either the President must do it himself, and be all the 
.while active in it, or 

"Devolve it on some member of his Cabinet. Once adopted, 
debates on it must end, and all agree and abide. It is not in 
my especial province. But I neither seek to evade nor to assume 
responsibility." 

On the same day Lincoln replied with a note which forever 
set at rest the doubt in Seward's mind as to who was to be 
President in fact. Seward was thoroughly frank and gener- 
ous and not a great while later wrote his wife, "Executive 
force and vigor are rare qualities; the President is the best 
of us." Henceforth he gave Lincoln the most faithful and 
complete support. 

The reply was on the part of Lincoln a fine example of self- 
restraint and selflessness, combined with a firm dignity. 

TO WILLIAM H. SEWARD 

Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861 
Hon. W. H. Seward. 

My dear Sir: Since parting with you I have been con- 
sidering your paper dated this day, and entitled "Some 

* These European nations had been active in making demon- 
strations against Mexico in the hope of forcing' the payment of 
debts due them. Seward's proposed device of uniting the coun- 
try by a foreign war was an old trick of politico-statesmen. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 269 

Thoughts for the President's Consideration." The first 
proposition in it is, "First, We are at the end of a month's 
administration, and yet without a policy either domestic 
or foreign." 

At the beginning of that month, in the inaugural, I 
said: "The power confided to me will be used to hold, 
occupy, and possess the property and places belonging 
to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts." 
This had your distinct approval at the time; and, taken 
in connection with the order I immediately gave General 
Scott, directing him to employ every means in his power 
to strengthen and hold the forts, comprises the exact 
domestic policy you now urge, witli the single exception 
that it does not propose to abandon Fort Sumter. 

Again, I do not perceive how the reenforcement of 
Fort Sumter would be done on a slavery or a party issue, 
while that of Fort Pickens would be on a more national 
and patriotic one. 

The news received yesterday in regard to St. Domingo* 
certainly brings a new item within the range of our 
foreign policy ; but up to that time we have been prepar- 
ing circulars and instructions to ministers and the like, 
all in perfect harmony, without even a suggestion that 
we had no foreign policy. 

Upon your closing propositions — that "whatever policy 
we adopt, there must be an energetic prosecution of it. 

"For this purpose it must be somebody's business to 
pursue and direct it incessantly. 

"Either the President must do it himself, and be all 
the while active in it, or 

"Devolve it on some member of his cabinet. Once 
adopted, debates on it must end, and all agree and abide" 
— I remark that if this must be done, I must do it. When 
a general line of policy is adopted, I apj^rehend there is 
no danger of its being changed without good reason, or 

• San Domingo had just requested Spain to assume again 
complete sovereignty over her. 



270 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

continuing to be a subject of unnecessary debate; still, 
upon points arising in its progress I wish, and suppose 
I am entitled to have, the advice of all the cabinet. 
Your obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 

Late in March Lincoln again submitted the question of 
Sumter to his cabinet. This time the vote stood five to two in 
favor of its relief. A little later he decided to attempt the 
relief of both Sumter and Pickens, with the full knowledge 
that it meant the opening of war, since notice had been given 
by the Confederate authorities that any attempt to relieve 
Sumter would result in its reduction. Seward had promised 
that notice of any expedition would be given, and Lincoln car- 
ried out the pledge. A prompt attack on the fort forced its 
fall on April 13. 

On the same day a committee from the Virginia convention, 
which had been in session since the winter, visited Lincoln. 
He had been most anxious to secure Virginia's support against 
war, and had gone so far as to offer to abandon Sumter if the 
convention would adjourn sine die, but the message had never 
been delivered to the convention. Now it was too late for 
negotiation. He replied to the committee in these words: 

REPLY TO A COMMITTEE FROM THE 
VIRGINIA CONVENTION 

[April 13, 1861] 

Hon. William Ballard Preston, Alexander H. H. Stuart, 

George W. Randolph, Esq. 

Gentlemen : As a committee of the Virginia Conven- 
tion now in session, you present me a preamble and 
resolution in these words: 

''Whereas, in the opinion of this Convention, the uncer- 
tainty which prevails in the public mind as to the policy 
which the Federal Executive intends to pursue toward 
the seceded states is extremely injurious to the industrial 
and commercial interests of the country, tends to keep 
up an excitement which is unfavorable to the adjustment 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 271 

of pending difficulties, and threatens a disturbance of 
the public peace; therefore 

"Resolved, that a committee of three delegates be 
appointed by this Convention to wait upon the President 
of the United States, present to him this preamble and 
resolution, and respectfully ask him to communicate to 
this Convention the policy which the Federal Executive 
intends to pursue in regard to the Confederate States. 

"Adopted by the Convention of the State of Virginia, 
Richmond, April 8, 1861." 

In answer T have to say that, having at the beginning 
of my official term expressed my intended policy as 
plainly as I was able, it is with deep regret and some 
mortification I now learn that there is great and injurious 
uncertainty in the public mind as to what that policy is, 
and what course I intend to pursue. Not having as yet 
seen occasion to change, it is now my purpose to pursue 
the course marked out in the inaugural address. I com- 
mend a careful consideration of the whole document as 
the best expression I can give of my purposes. 

As I then and therein said, I now repeat: "The power 
confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess 
the property and places belonging to the government, and 
to collect the duties and imposts; but be3^ond what is 
necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion, no 
using of force against or among the people anywhere." 
By the words "property and places belonging to the 
government," I chiefly allude to the military posts and 
property which were in the possession of the government 
when it came to my hands. 

But if, as now appears to be true, in pursuit of a pur- 
pose to drive the United States authority from these 
places, an unprovoked assault has been made upon Fort 
Sumter, I shall hold myself at liberty to repossess, if I 
can, like places which had been seized before the govern- 
ment was devolved upon me. And in every event I shall, 
to the extent of ray ability, repel force by force'. In 



272 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

case it proves true that Fort Sumter has been assaulted, 
as is reported^ I shall perhaps cause the United States 
mails to be withdrawn from all the states which claim 
to have seceded, believing that the commencement of 
actual war against the government justifies and possibly 
demands this. 

I scarcely need to say that I consider the military 
posts and property situated within the states which claim 
to have seceded as yet belonging to the government of 
the United States as much as they did before the sup- 
posed secession. 

Whatever else I may do for the purpose, I shall not 
attempt to collect the duties and imposts by any armed 
invasion of any part of the country ; not meaning by this, 
however, that I may not land a force deemed necessary 
to relieve a fort upon a border of the country. 

From the fact that I have quoted a part of the 
inaugural address, it must not be inferred that I repu- 
diate an}'^ other part, the whole of which I reaffirm, 
except so far as what I now say of the mails may be 
regarded as a modification. 



On April 15 Lincoln called upon the governors of the states 
for 75,000 men to suppress what he termed "unlawful com- 
binations" in the seceded states. Every care was taken from 
the beginning of the war not to make any move against a 
state as such, for the Border states and many people in the 
North, like Buchanan, did not believe that the United States 
had any power to coerce a state. 

With the call for troops, uncertainty ended in the North 
and South, and the people rushed to arms. Virginia, Arkan- 
sas, Tennessee, and North Carolina seceded. Missouri and 
Maryland were prevented from doing so only by force. Ken- 
tucky declared herself neutral in the impending conflict. The 
struggle for the preservation of the Union had begun. 

With the outbreak of actual war, I^incoln's one aim became 
the preservation of the Union. All else disappeared from view, 
and to that end he gave his undivided attention. His letters 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 273 

show this. The people of Maryland at this time objected to 
the passage of troops across the state to Washington for the 
invasion of Virginia. The Sixth Massachusetts was attacked 
bv a mob as it crossed Baltimore, with resulting bloodshed on 
both sides. Reverdy Mohnson, a distinguished Maryland law- 
yer, wrote Lincoln a letter on the subject, which brought this 
reply: 

TO REVERDY JOHNSON 
[Confidential] 
Executive Mansion, April 24, 1861 
Hon. Reverdy Johnson. 

My dear Sir: Your note of this morning is just 
received. I forbore to answer yours of the 22d because 
of my aversion (which I thought you understood) to get- 
ting on paper and furnishing new grounds for misunder- 
standing. I do say the sole purpose of bringing troops 
here is to defend this capital. I do say I have no purpose 
to invade Virginia with them or any other troops, as I 
understand the word invasion. But, suppose Virginia 
sends her troops, or admits others through her borders, 
to assail this capital, am I not to repel them even to the 
crossing of the Potomac, if I can? Suppose Virginia 
erects, or permits to be erected, batteries on the opposite 
shore to bombard the citj'', are we to stand still and see 
it done? In a word, if Virginia strikes us, are we not 
to strike back, and as effectively as we can? Again, are 
we not to hold Fort Monroe (for instance) if we can? 
I have no objection to declare a thousand times that I 
have no purpose to invade Virginia or any other state, 
but I do not mean to let them invade us without striking 
back. Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Gustavus V. Fox, later Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 
had planned the expedition to relieve Sumter. This letter to 
him from the President is interesting because of the view it 
gives of the latter's purpose in relieving Fort Sumter. 



274 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO OU8TAVUS V. FOX 

Washington, D. C, May 1, 1861 
Captain G. V. Fox. 

My dear Sir: I sincerely regret that the failure of 
the late attempt to provision Fort Sumter should be the 
source of any annoyance to you. 

The practicability of your plan was not, in fact, 
brought to a test. By reason of a gale, well known in 
advance to be possible and not improbable, the tugs, an 
essential part of the plan, never reached the ground ; 
while, by an accident for which you were in no wise 
responsible, and possibly I to some extent was, you were 
deprived of a war vessel,* with her men, which you 
deemed of great importance to the enterprise. 

I most cheerfully and truly declare that the failure of 
the undertaking has not lowered you a particle, while 
the qualities you developed in the effort have greatly 
heightened you in my estimation. 

For a daring and dangerous enterprise of a similar 
character you would today be the man of all my acquaint- 
ances whom I would select. You and I both anticipated 
that the cause of the country would be advanced by mak- 
ing the attempt to provision Fort Sumter, even if it 
should fail; and it is no small consolation now to feel 
that our anticipation is justified by the result. 
Very truly your friend, 

A. Lincoln 

Colonel E, E. Ellsworth, who had been a law student in 
Lincoln's office, was killed in Alexandria while hauling down 
the Confederate flag. This letter to his parents is the first 
of the many letters of condolence Lincoln wrote during the 
war. It is particularly interesting in comparison with the 
letter to Mrs. Bixby written three years later. 

* The Powhatan was detached from the Sumter expedition 
and sent to Fort Pickens without the knowledge of the officers 
in charge of the expedition. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 275 

TO COLONEL ELLSWORTH'S PARENTS 

Washington, D. C, May 25, 1861 

To the Father and Mother of Colonel Elmer E. Ells- 
worth. 

]\Iy DEAR Sir and Madam: In the untimely loss of 
your noble son, our affliction here is scarcely less than 
your own. So much of promised usefulness to one's 
country, and of bright hopes for oneself and friends, 
have rarely been so suddenly dashed as in his fall. In 
size, in years, and in youthful appearance a boy only, 
his power to command men was surpassingly great. This 
power, combined with a fine intellect, an indomitable 
energy, and a taste altogether military, constituted in 
him, as seemed to me, the best natural talent in that 
department I ever knew. 

And yet he was singularly modest and deferential in 
social intercourse. My acquaintance with him began 
less than two years ago; yet through the latter half of 
the intervening period it was as intimate as the disparity 
of our ages and my engrossing engagements would per- 
mit. To me he appeared to have no indulgences or 
pastimes; and I never heard him utter a profane or an 
intemperate word. What was conclusive of his good 
heart, he never forgot his parents. The honors he labored 
for so laudably, and for which in the sad end he so gal- 
lantly gave his life, he meant for them no less than for 
himself. 

In the hope that it may be no intrusion upon the 
sacredness of your sorrow, I have ventured to address 
you this tribute to the memorv of my young friend and 
your brave and earh^ fallen child. 

May God give you that consolation which is beyond 
all earthly power. 

Sincerely your friend in a common affliction, 

A. Lincoln 



276 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

At the same time that he called for troops, Lincoln sum- 
moned Congress to meet in special session on July 4. When it 
assembled he stated the existing situation in a special mes- 
sage. It is an exceedingly able document and is worth careful 
study as one of the strongest statements of the national posi- 
tion in the war. It is, however, in its spirit and in its ignoring 
of undisputed historical facts, a lawyer's presentation and far 
more partisan than one is accustomed to find from Lincoln. 

MESSAGE TO CONGRESS IN SPECIAL SESSION 
[July 4, 1861] 

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of 
Representatives : Having been convened on an extraord- 
dinary occasion, as authorized by the Constitution, your 
attention is not called to any ordinary subject of 
legislation. 

At the beginning of the present presidential term, 
four months ago, the functions of the Federal Govern- 
ment were found to be generally suspended within the 
several states of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, 
Mississippi, Louisiana, and Plorida, excepting only those 
of the Post Office Department. 

Within these states all the forts, arsenals, dockyards, 
custom-houses, and the like, including the movable and 
stationary property in and about them, had been seized, 
and were held in open hostility to this government, 
excepting only Forts Pickens, Taylor, and Jefferson, on 
and near the Florida coast, and Fort Sumter, in Charles- 
ton Harbor, South Carolina. The forts thus seized liad 
been put in improved condition, new ones had been built, 
and armed forces had been organized and were organiz- 
ing, all avowedly with the same hostile purpose. 

The forts remaining in the possession of the Federal 
Government in and near these states were either besieged 
or menaced by warlike preparations, and especially Fort 
Sumter was nearly surrounded by well-protected hostile 
batteries, with guns equal in quality to tlie best of its 



SELECTIONS FR03I LINXOLX 277 

own, and outnumbering the latter as perhaps ten to one. 
A disproportionate share of the Federal muskets and 
rifles had somehow found their way into these states, and 
had been seized to be used against the government. 
Accumulations of the public revenue lying within them 
had been seized for the same object. The navy was 
scattered in distant seas, leaving but a very small part 
of it within immediate reach of the government. Officers 
of the Federal army and navy resigned in great numbers; 
and of those resigning a large proportion had taken up 
arms against the government. Simultaneously, and in 
connection with all this, the purpose to sever the Federal 
Union was openly avowed. In accordance with this pur- 
pose, an ordinance had been adopted in each of these 
states, declaring the states respectively to be separated 
from the National Union. A formula for instituting a 
combined government of these states had been promul- 
gated; and this illegal organization, in the character of 
confederate states, was already invoking recognition, aid, 
and intervention from foreign powers. 

Finding this condition of things, and believing it to be 
an imperative duty upon the incoming Executive to pre- 
vent, if possible, the consummation of such attempt to 
destroy the Federal Union, a choice of means to that end 
became indispensable. This choice was made and was 
declared in the inaugural address. The policy chosen 
looked to the exhaustion of all peaceful measures before 
a resort to any stronger ones. It sought only to hold 
the public places and property not already wrested from 
the government, and to collect the revenue, relying for 
the rest on time, discussion, and the ballot-box. It 
promised a continuance of the mails at government 
expense, to the very people who were resisting the 
government; and it gave repeated pledges against any 
disturbance to any of the people, or any of their rights. 
Of all that which a President might constitutionally and 
justifiably do in such a case, everything was forborne 



278 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

without which it was believed possible to keep the govern- 
ment on foot. 

On the 5th of March (the present incumbent's first 
full day in office), a letter of Major Anderson, command- 
ing at Fort Sumter, written on the 28th day of February 
and received at the War Department on the 4th of 
March, was by that department placed in his hands. 
This letter expressed the professional opinion of the 
writer that reenforcements could not be thrown into that 
fort within the time for his relief, rendered necessary by 
the limited supply of provisions, and with a view of 
holding possession of the same, with a force of less than 
twenty thousand good and well-disciplined men. This 
opinion was concurred in by all the officers of his com- 
mand, and their memoranda on the subject were made 
inclosures of Major Anderson's letter. The whole was 
immediately laid before Lieutenant-General Scott, who 
at once concurred with Major Anderson in opinion. On 
reflection, however, he took full time, consulting with 
other officers, both of the army and the navy, and at the 
end of four days came reluctantly but decidedly to the 
same conclusion as before. He also stated at the same 
time that no such sufficient force was then at the control 
of the government, or could be raised and brought to 
the ground within the time when the provisions in the 
fort would be exhausted. In a purely military point of 
view, this reduced the duty of the administration in the 
case to the mere matter of getting the garrison safely 
out of the fort. 

It is believed, however, that to so abandon that posi- 
tion, under the circumstances, would be utterly ruinous; 
that the necessity under which it was to be done would 
not be fully understood ; that by many it would be con- 
strued as a part of a voluntary policy; that at home it 
would discourage friends of the Union, embolden its 
adversaries, and go far to insure to the latter a recogni- 
tion abroad; that, in fact, it would be our national 



SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLN 279 

destruction consummated. This could not be allowed. 
Starvation was not yet upon the garrison, and ere it 
would be reached, Fort Pickens might be reenforced. 
This last would be a clear indication of policy, and would 
better enable the country to accept the evacuation of 
Fort Sumter as a military necessity. An order was at 
once directed to be sent for the landing of the troops 
from the steamship Brooklyn into Fort Pickens. This 
order could not go by land, but must take the longer and 
slower route by sea. The first return news from the 
order was received just one week before the fall of Fort 
Sumter. The news itself was that the officer commanding 
the Sabine, to which vessel the troops had been trans- 
ferred from the Brooklyn, acting upon some quasi armi- 
stice of the late administration (and of the existence of 
which the present administration, up to the time the 
order was dispatched, had only too vague and uncertain 
rumors to fix attention), had refused to land the troops. 
To now reenforce Fort Pickens before a crisis would be 
reached at Fort Sumter was impossible — rendered so by 
the near exhaustion of provisions in the latter-named 
fort. In precaution against such a conjuncture, the 
government had, a few days before, commenced prepar- 
ing an expedition as well adapted as might be to relieve 
Fort Sumter, which expedition was intended to be ulti- 
mately used, or not, according to circumstances. The 
strongest anticijDated case for using it was now presented, 
and it was resolved to send it forward. As had been 
intended in this contingency, it was also resolved to 
notify the Governor of South Carolina that he might 
expect an attempt would be made to provision the fort; 
and that, if the attempt should not be resisted, there 
would be no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition, 
without further notice, or in case of an attack upon the 
fort. This notice was accordingly given ; whereupon the 
fort was attacked and bombarded to its fall, without even 
awaiting the arrival of the provisioning expedition. 



280 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

It is thus seen that the assault upon and reduction of 
Fort Sumter was in no sense a matter of self-defense 
on the part of the assailants.* They well knew that the 
garrison in the fort could by no possibility commit 
aggression upon them. They knew — they were expressly 
notified — that the giving of bread to a few brave and 
hungry men of the garrison was all which would on that 
occasion be attempted, unless themselves, by resisting 
so much, should provoke more. They knew that this 
government desired to keep the garrison in the fort, not 
to assail them, but merely to maintain visible possession, 
and thus to preserve the Union from actual and imme- 
diate dissolution — trusting, as hereinbefore stated, to 
time, discussion, and the ballot-box for final adjustment; 
and they assailed and reduced the fort for precisely the 
reverse object — to drive out the visible authority of the 
Federal Union, and thus force it to immediate dissolu- 
tion. That this was their object the Executive well under- 
stood; and having said to them in the inaugural address, 
"You can have no conflict without being yourselves the 
aggressors," he took pains not only to keep this declara- 
tion good, but also to keep the case so free from the power 
of ingenious sophistry that the world should not be able 
to misunderstand it. By the affair at Fort Sumter, with 
its surrounding circumstances, that point was reached. 
Then and tliereby the assailants of the government began 
the conflict of arms, without a gun in sight or in expect- 
ancy to return their fire, save onlj' the few in the fort 
sent to that harbor years before for their own protection, 
and still ready to give that protection in whatever was 
lawful. In this act, discarding all else, they have forced 
upon the country the distinct issue, "immediate dissolution 
or blood." 

And this issue embraces more than the fate of the 

United States. It presents to the whole family of man 

* Lincoln of course did not see that from the standpoint of 
the South the retention of Fort Sumter, even without any attempt 
to relieve it, was an act of aggression. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 281 

the question whether a constitutional republic or democ- 
racy — a government of the people by the same people — 
can or cannot maintain its territorial integrity against 
its own domestic foes. It presents the question whether 
discontented individuals, too few in number to control 
administration according to organic law in any case, can 
always, by the pretenses made in this case, or on any 
other pretenses, or arbitrarily without any pretense, 
break up their government, and thus practically put an 
end to free government upon the earth. It forces us to 
ask: "Is there, in all republics, this inherent and fatal 
weakness?" "Must a government, of necessity, be too 
strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak 
to maintain its own existence?" 

So viewing the issue, no choice was left but to call out 
the war power of the government; and so to resist force 
employed for its destruction, by force for its preservation. 

The call was made, and the response of the country 
was most gratifying, surpassing in unanimity and spirit 
the most sanguine expectation. Yet none of the states 
commonly called slave states, except Delaware, gave a 
regiment through regular state organization. A few 
regiments have been organized within some others of 
those states by individual enterprise, and received into 
the government service. Of course the seceded states, 
so called (and to which Texas had been joined about the 
time of the inauguration), gave no troops to the cause of 
the Union. The border states, so called, were not uniform 
in their action, some of them being almost for the Union, 
while in others — as Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, 
and Arkansas — the Union sentiment was nearly repressed 
and silenced. The course taken in Virginia was the most 
remarkable — perhaps the most important. A convention 
elected by the people of that state to consider the very 
question of disrupting the Federal Union was in session 
at the capital of Virginia when Fort Sumter fell. To this 
body the people had chosen a large majority of professed 



282 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

Union men. Almost immediately after the fall of Sumter, 
many members of that majority went over to the original 
disunion minority, and with them adopted an ordinance 
for withdrawing the state from the Union. Whether 
this change was wrought by their great approval of the 
assault upon Sumter or their great resentment at the 
government's resistance to that assault, is not definitely 
known. Although they submitted the ordinance for rati- 
fication to a vote of the people, to be taken on a day then 
somewhat more than a month distant, the convention and 
the legislature (which was also in session at the same 
time and place), with leading men of the state not mem- 
bers of either, immediately commenced acting as if the 
state were already out of the Union. They pushed mili- 
tary preparations vigorously forward all over the state. 
They seized the United States armory at Harpers Ferry, 
and the navy-yard at Gosport, near Norfolk. They 
received — perhaps invited — into their state large bodies 
of troops, with their warlike appointments, from the 
so-called seceded states. They formally entered into a 
treaty of temporary alliance and cooperation with the 
so-called "Confederate States," and sent members to 
their congress at Montgomery. And, finally, they per- 
mitted the insurrectionary government to be transferred 
to their capital at Richmond. 

The people of Virginia have thus allowed this giant 
insurrection to make its nest within her borders ; and this 
government has no choice left but to deal with it where 
it finds it. And it has the less regret as the loyal citizens 
have, in due form, claimed its protection. Those loyal 
citizens this government is bound to recognize and protect, 
as being Virginia. 

In the border states, so. called — in fact, the Middle 
States — there are those who favor a policy which they 
call "armed neutrality" ; that is, an arming of those states 
to prevent the Union forces passing one way, or the dis- 
union the other, over their soil. This would be disunion 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 283 

completed. Figuratively speaking, it would be the build- 
ing of an impassable wall along the line of separation — 
and yet not quite an impassable one, for under the guise 
of neutrality it would tie the hands of Union men and 
freely pass supplies from among them to the insurrec- 
tionists, which it could not do as an open enemy. At a 
stroke it would take all the trouble oif the hands of seces- 
sion, except only what proceeds from the external 
blockade. It would do for the disunionists that which, 
of all things, they most desire — feed them well, and give 
them disunion without a struggle of their own. It recog- 
nizes no fidelity to the Constitution, no obligation to 
maintain the Union; and while very many who have 
favored it are doubtless loyal citizens, it is, nevertheless, 
very injurious in effect. 

Recurring to the action of the government, it may be 
stated that at first a call was made for 75,000 militia, 
and, rapidly following this, a proclamation was issued 
for closing the ports of the insurrectionary district 
by proceedings in the nature of blockade.* So far all 
was believed to be strictly legal. At this point the 
insurrectionists announced their purpose to enter upon 
the practice of privateering. 

Other calls were made for volunteers to serve for three 
years, unless sooner discharged, and also for large addi- 
tions to the regular army and navy. These measures, 
whether strictly legal or not, were ventured upon, under 
what appeared to be a popular demand and a public 
necessit}^; trusting then, as now, that Congress would 
readily ratify them. It is believed that nothing has been 
done beyond the constitutional competency of Congress. 
Soon after the first call for militia, it was considered 
a duty to authorize the commanding general in proper 
cases, according to his discretion, to suspend the privilege 

* Lincoln's proclamation of the blockade of the Southern ports 
was held by many to be a recognition of the separation of the 
seceded states from the Union, since the President could not 
blockade home ports without an act of Congress. 



284 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

of the writ of habeas corpus,'^ 01% in other words, to arrest 
and detain, without resort to the ordinary processes and 
forms of law, such individuals as he might deem danger- 
ous to the public safety. This authority has purposely 
been exercised but very sparingly. Nevertheless, the 
legality and propriety of what has been done under it 
are questioned, and the attention of the country has been 
called to the proposition that one who has sworn to "take 
care that the laws be faithfully executed" should not 
himself violate them. Of course some consideration was 
given to the questions of power and propriety before 
this matter was acted upon. The whole of the laws 
which were required to be faithfully executed were beinaj 
resisted and failing of execution in nearly one-third of 
the states. Must they be allowed to finally fail of execu- 
tion, even had it been perfectly clear that by the use of 
the means necessary to their execution some single law, 
made in such extreme tenderness of the citizen's liberty 
that, practically, it relieves more of the guilty than of 
the innocent, should to a very limited extent be violated? 
To state the question more directly, are all the laws but 
one to go unexecuted, and the government itself go to 
pieces, lest that one be violated? Even in such a case, 
would not the official oath be broken if the government 
should be overthrown, when it was believed that dis- 
regarding the single law would tend to preserve it ? But 
it was not believed that this question was presented. It 
was not believed that any law was violated. The pro- 
vision of the Constitution that "the privilege of the writ 
of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when, in 
cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may 
require it," is equivalent to a provision — is a provision — 

♦ The acts of the President thus described marked the begin- 
ning' of the military dictatorship whicli pi-evailed tlirougliout tlie 
war, based upon the war powers of tlie President. Tliey were 
without authority of law. Never in the history of an English- 
speaking people, from the first Habeas Corpus Act, had the sus- 
pension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus been claimed 
as an executive power. In the Constitution the provision for its 
suspension appears in the legislative article. 






SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 285 

that such privilege may be suspended when, in case of 
rebellion or invasion, the public safety does require it. 
It was decided that we have a case of rebellion, and that 
the public safety does require the qualified suspension 
of the privilege of the writ which was authorized to be 
made. Now it is insisted that Congress, and not the 
Executive, is vested with this power. But the Constitution 
itself is silent as to which or who is to exercise the power; 
and as the provision was plainly made for a dangerous 
emergency, it cannot be believed the framers of the 
instrument intended that in every case the danger should 
run its course until Congress could be called together, 
the very assembling of which might be prevented, as was 
intended in this case, by the rebellion. 

No more extended argument is now offered, as an 
opinion at some length will probably be presented by the 
Attorney General. Whether there shall be any legislation 
upon the subject, and if any, what, is submitted entirely 
to the better judgment of Congress. 

The forbearance of this government had been so 
extraordinary and so long continued as to lead some 
foreign nations to shape their action as if they supposed 
the early destruction of our National Union was prob- 
able. While this, on discovery, gave the Executive some 
concern, he is now happy to say that the sovereignty and 
rights of the United States are now everywhere prac- 
tically respected by foreign powers; and a general 
sympathy with the country is manifested throughout the 
world. 

The reports of the Secretaries of the Treasury, War, 
and the Navy will give the information in detail deemed 
necessary and convenient for your deliberation and 
action; while the Executive and all the departments will 
stand ready to supply omissions, or to communicate new 
facts considered important for you to know. 

It is now recommended that you give the legal means 
for making this contest a short and decisive one; that 



286 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

you place at the control of the government for the work 
at least four hundred thousand men and $400^000,000. 
That number of men is about one-tenth of those of proper 
ages within the regions where, apparently, all are willing 
to engage ; and the sum is less than a twenty-third part of 
the money value owned by the men who seem ready to 
devote the whole. A debt* of $600,000,000 now is a less 
sum per head than was the debt of our Revolution when 
we came out of that struggle; and the money value in 
the country now bears even a greater proportion to what 
it was then than does the population. Surely each man 
has as strong a motive now to preserve our liberties as 
each had then to establish them. 

A right result at this time will be worth more to the 
world than ten times the men and ten times the money. 
The evidence reaching us from the country leaves no 
doubt that the material for the work is abundant;, and 
that it needs only the hand of legislation to give it legal 
sanction, and the hand of the Executive to give it practical 
shape and efficiency. One of the greatest perplexities 
of the government is to avoid receiving troops faster than 
it can provide for them. In a word, the people will save 
their government if the government itself will do its part 
only indiiferently well. 

It might seem, at first thought, to be of little difference 
whether the present movement at the South be called 
"secession" or "rebellion." The movers, however, will 
understand the difference. At the beginning they knew 
they could never raise their treason to any respectable 
magnitude by any name which implies violation of law. 
They knew their people possessed as much of moral 
sense, as much of devotion to law and order, and as much 
pride in and reverence for the history and government 
of their common country as any other civilized and 
patriotic people. They knew they could make no advance- 
ment directly in the teeth of these strong and noble 
sentiments. Accordingly, they commenced bj?^ an insidious 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 287 

debauching of the public mind. They invented an ingeni- 
ous sophism which, if conceded, was followed by perfectly 
logical steps, through all the incidents, to the complete 
destruction of the Union. The sophism itself is that any 
state of the Union may consistently with the National 
Constitution, and therefore lawfully and peacefully, 
withdraw from the Union without the consent of the 
Union or of any other state. The little disguise, that the 
supposed right is to be exercised only for just cause, 
themselves to be the sole judges of its justice, is too thin 
to merit any notice.* 

With rebellion thus sugar-coated they have been drug- 
ging the public mind of their section for more than thirty 
years, until at length they have brought many good men 
to a willingness to take up arms against the government 
the day after some assemblage of men have enacted the 
farcical pretense of taking their state out of the Union, 
who could have been brought to no such thing the day 
before. 

This sophism derives much, perhaps the whole, of its 
currency from the assumption that there is some omnipo- 
tent and sacred supremacy pertaining to a state — to each 
state of our Federal Union. Our states have neither 
more nor less power than that reserved to them in the 
Union by the Constitution — no one of them ever having 
been a state out of the Union. f The original ones passed 
into the Union even 'before they cast off their British 
colonial dependence; and the new ones each came into 
the Ll'nion directh^ from a condition of dependence, 
excepting Texas. And even Texas, in its temporary 
independence, was never designated a state. The new 
ones only took the designation of states on coming into 
the Union, while that name was first adopted for the 

* With due respect for the influence of the heat of war, 

Lincohi must be accused of special pleading here. He was too 
well acquainted v/ith American history and with the feeling of 
the country not to be aware of the absolute hold of the doctrine 
of state sovereignty upon the Southern people. 

t North Carolina and Rhode Island both occupied this position. 



288 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

old ones in and by the Declaration of Independence. 
Therein the "United Colonies" were declared to be "free 
and independent states"; but even then the object plainly 
was not to declare their independence of one another or 
of the Union, but directly the contrary, as their mutual 
pledge and their mutual action before, at the time, and 
afterward, abundantly show. The express plighting of 
faith by each and all of the original thirteen in the Arti- 
cles of Confederation, two years later, that the Union 
shall be perpetual, is most conclusive. Having never 
been states either in substance or in name outside of the 
Union, whence this magical omnipotence of "State 
Rights," asserting a claim of power to lawfully destroy 
the Union itself.^ Much is said about the "sovereignty" 
of the states; but the word even is not in the National 
Constitution, nor, as is believed, in any of the state con- 
stitutions. What is "sovereignty" in the political sense 
of the term.'* Would it be far wrong to define it "a 
political community without a political superior" ? Tested 
by this, no one of our states except Texas ever was a 
sovereignty. And even Texas gave up the character on 
coming into the Union; by which act she acknowledged 
the Constitution of the United States, and the laws and 
treaties of the United States made in pursuance of the 
Constitution, to be for her the supreme law of the land. 
The states have their status in the Union, and they have 
no other legal status. If they break from this, they can 
only do so against law and by revolution. The Union, 
and not themselves separately, procured their independ- 
ence and their libert3^ By conquest or purchase the 
Union gave each of them whatever of independence or 
liberty it has. The Union is older than any of the states, 
and, in fact, it created them as states. Originally some 
dependent colonies made the Union, and, in turn, the 
Union threw off their old dependence for them, and made 
them states, such as they are. Not one of them ever had 
a state constitution independent of the Union. Of course. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 289 

it is not forgotten that all the new states framed their 
constitutions before they entered the Union — neverthe- 
less, dependent upon and preparatory to coming into 
the Union. ^ 

Unquestionably the states have the powers and rights 
reserved to them in and by the National Constitution; 
but among these surely are not included all conceivable 
powers, however mischievous or destructive, but, at most, 
such only as were known in the world at the time as 
governmental powers ; and certainly a power to destroy 
the government itself had never been known as a govern- 
mental, as a merely administrative power. This relative 
matter of national power and state rights, as a principle, 
is no other than the principle of generality and locality. 
Whatever concerns the whole should be confided to the 
whole — to the General Government; while whatever con- 
cerns only the state should be left exclusively to the state. 
This is all there is of the original principle about it. 
Whether the National Constitution in defining boundaries 
between the two has applied the principle with exact 
accuracy, is not to be questioned. We are all bound by 
that defining, without question. 

What is now combated is the position that secession 
is consistent with the Constitution — is lawful and peace- 
ful. It is not contended that there is any express law 
for it; and nothing should ever be implied as Taw vv^hich 
leads to unjust or absurd consequences. The nation 
purchased with money the countries out of which several 
of these states were formed. Is it just that they shall 
go off without leave and without refunding.^ The nation 
paid very large sums (in the aggregate, I believe, nearly 
a hundred millions) to relieve Florida of the aboriginal 
tribes. Is it just that she shall now be off without consent 
or without making any return.'^ The nation is now in 
debt for money applied to the benefit of these so-called 

* This is a remarkably able statement of the theory of the 
Union, comparatively new at that time. 



290 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

seceding states in common with the rest. Is it just either 
that creditors shall go unpaid or the remaining states 
pay the whole ?^ A part of the present national debt 
was contracted to pay the old debts of Texas. f Is it just 
that she shall leave and pay no part of this herself? 

Again, if one state may secede, so may another; and 
when all shall have seceded, none is left to pay the debts. 
Is this quite just to creditors.^ Did we notif}^ them of 
this sage view of ours when we borrowed their money? 
If we now recognize this doctrine by allowing the 
seceders to go in peace, it is difficult to see what we can 
do if others choose to go or to extort terms upon which 
they will promise to remain. 

The seceders insist that our Constitution admits of 
secession. They have assumed to make a national con- 
stitution of their own^ in which of necessity they have 
either discarded or retained the right of secession as they 
insist it exists in ours. If they have discarded it, they 
thereby admit that on principle it ought not to be in 
ours. If they have retained it by their own construction 
of ours, they show that to be consistent they must secede 
from one another whenever they shall find it the easiest 
way of settling their debts, or effecting any other selfish 
or unjust object. The principle itself is one of disinte- 
gration, and upon which no government can possibly 
endure. 

If all the states save one should assert the power to 
drive that one out of the Union, it is presumed the whole 
class of seceder politicians would at once deny the power 
and denounce the act as the greatest outrage UDon state 
rights. But suppose that precisely the same act, instead 
of being called "driving the one out," should be called 
"the seceding of the others from that one," it would be 
exactly what the seceders claim to do, unless, indeed, 

* The Southern states in their attempt to negotiate with the 
United States had as one declared purpose the adjustment of 
the national debt. 

t Texas surrendered her claims upon a large part of New 
Mexico in exchange for this payment. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 291 

they make the point that the one, because it is a minority, 
may rightfully do what the others, because they are a 
majority^ may not rightfully do. These politicians are 
subtle and profound on the rights of minorities. They 
are not partial to that power which made the Constitution 
and si)eaks from the preamble, calling itself "We, the 
People." 

It may well be questioned whether there is today a 
majority of the legally qualified voters of any state, 
except perhaps South Carolina, in favor of disunion. 
There is much reason to believe that the Union men are 
the majority in many, if not in every other one, of the 
so-called seceded states. The contrary has not been 
demonstrated in any one of them. It is ventured to 
affirm this even of Virginia and Tennessee ; for the result 
of an election held in military camps, where the bayonets 
are all on one side of the question voted upon, can scarcely 
be considered as demonstrating popular sentiment. At 
such an election, all that large class who are at once 
for the Union and against coercion would be coerced to 
vote against the Union. 

It may be affirmed without extravagance that the free 
institutions we enjoy have developed the powers and 
improved the condition of our whole people beyond any 
example in the v/orld. Of this we now have a striking 
and impressive illustration. So large an army as the 
government has now on foot was never before known, 
without a soldier in it but who has taken his place there 
of his own free choice. But more than this, there are 
many single regiments whose members, one and another, 
possess full practical knowledge of all the arts, sciences, 
professions, and whatever else, whether useful or ele- 
gant, is known in the world; and there is scarceh^ one 
from which there could not be selected a president, a 
cabinet, a congress, and perhaps a court, abundantly 
competent to administer the government itself. Nor do 
I say this is not true also in the army of our late friends, 



292 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

now adversaries in this contest; but if it is, so much 
better the reason why the government which has con- 
ferred such benefits on both them and us should not be 
broken up. Whoever in any section proposes to abandon 
such a government would do well to consider in deference 
to what principle it is that he does it — what better he 
is likely to get in its stead — whether the substitute will 
give, or be intended to give, so much of good to the 
people. There are some foreshadowings on this subject. 
Our adversaries have adopted some declarations of inde- 
pendence in which, unlike the good old one, penned by 
Jefferson, they omit the words "all men are created 
equal." Why.^ They have adopted a temporary na- 
tional constitution, in the preamble of which, unlike our 
good old one, signed by Washington, they omit "We, 
the People," and substitute, "W"e, the deputies of the 
sovereign and independent states." Why.^ Why this 
deliberate pressing out of view the rights of men and 
the authority of the people.^ 

This is essentially a people's contest. On the side of 
the Union it is a struggle for maintaining in the world 
that form and substance of government whose leading 
object is to elevate the condition of men — to lift artificial 
weights from all shoulders ; to clear the paths of laudable 
pursuit for all; to afford all an unfettered start, and a 
fair chance in the race of life. Yielding to partial and 
temporary departures, from necessity, this is the leading 
object of the government for whose existence we contend. 

I am most happy to believe that the plain people 
understand and appreciate this. It is worthy of note 
that while in this, the government's hour of trial, large 
numbers of those in the army and navy who have been 
favored with the offices have resigned and proved false 
to the hand which had pampered them, not one common 
soldier or common sailor is known to have deserted his 
flag. 

Great honor is due to those officers who remained 






SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 293 

true, despite the example of their treacherous associates ; 
but the greatest honor, and most important fact of all, 
is the unanimous firmness of the common soldiers and 
common sailors. To the last man, so far as known, they 
have successfully resisted the traitorous efforts of those 
whose commands, but an hour before, they obeyed as 
absolute law. This is the patriotic instinct of the plain 
people. They understand, without an argument, that 
the destroying of the government which was made by 
Washington means no good to them. 

Our popular government has often been called an 
experiment. Two points in it our people have already 
settled — the successful establishing and the successful 
administering of it. One still remains — its successful 
maintenance against a formidable internal attempt to 
overthrow it. It is now for them to demonstrate to the 
world that those who can fairly carry an election can 
also suppress a rebellion; that ballots are the rightful 
and peaceful successors of bullets ; and that when ballots 
have fairly and constitutionally decided, there can be 
no successful appeal back to bullets; that there can be 
no successful appeal, except to ballots themselves, at 
succeeding elections. Such will be a great lesson of 
peace; teaching men that what they cannot take by an 
election, neither can they take it by a war; teaching all 
the folly of being the beginners of a war. 

Lest there be some uneasiness in the minds of candid 
men as to what is to be the course of the government 
toward the Southern states after the rebellion shall have 
been suppressed, the Executive deems it proper to say 
it will be his purpose then, as ever, to be guided by the 
Constitution and the laws ; and that he probably will 
have no different understanding of the powers and duties 
of the Federal Government relatively to the rights of 
the states and the people, under the Constitution, than 
that expressed in the inaugural address. 

He desires to preserve the government, that it may 



294 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

be administered f(»r all as it was administered by the 
men who made it. Loyal citizens everywhere have the 
right to claim this of their government, and the govern- 
ment has no right to withhold or neglect it. It is not 
perceived that in giving it there is any coercion, any 
conquest, or any subjugation, in any just sense of those 
terms. 

The Constitution provides, and all the states have 
accepted the provision, that "the United States shall 
guarantee to every state in this Union a republican form 
of government." But if a state may lawfully go out of 
the Union, having done so, it may also discard the 
republican form of government; so that to prevent its 
going out is an indispensable means to the end of main- 
taining the guaranty mentioned; and when an end is 
lawful and obligator^'-, the indispensable means to it are 
also lawful and obligatory. 

It was with the deepest regret that the Executive 
found the duty of employing the war power in defense 
of the government forced upon him. He could but per- 
form this duty or surrender the existence of the govern- 
ment. No compromise by public servants could, in this 
case, be a cure; not that compromises are not often 
proper, but that no popular government can long survive 
a marked precedent that those who carry an election can 
only save the government from immediate destruction 
by giving up the main point upon which the people gave 
the election. The people themselves, and not their 
servants, can safely reverse their own deliberate decisions. 

As a private citizen the Executive could not have con- 
sented that these institutions shall perish; much less 
could he, in betrayal of so vast and so sacred a trust as 
the free people have confided to him. He felt that he 
had no moral right to shrink, nor even to count the 
chances of his own life in what might follow. In full 
view of his great responsibility he has, so far, done what 
he has deemed his duty. You will now, according to 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 295 

your own judgment^ perform yours. He sincerely hopes 
that your views and your actions may so accord with 
his as to assure all faithful citizens who have been dis- 
turbed in their rights of a certain and speedy restoration 
to them, under the Constitution and the laws. 

And having thus chosen our course, without guile and 
with pure purpose, let us renew our trust in God, and 
go forward without fear and with manly hearts. 

Abraham Lincoln 

Soon after the opening of the war, anti-slavery sentiment 
in the North began to grow very rapidly. As it grew stronger, 
suggestions of emancipation increased in number. Lincoln 
saw clearly that emancipation at this time would almost cer- 
tainly result in the loss to the Union of Maryland, Kentucky, 
and Missouri, with the additional loss of the support of those in 
the North who were opposed to a war of emancipation. He 
therefore set his face against any of the suggestions. In 
August, General John C. Fremont, who was in command of the 
Department of the West, proclaimed the emancipation of all 
slaves of Confederate supporters in Missouri. Lincoln at once 
^ sent him this letter by special messenger: 

TO GENERAL JOHN C. FREMONT 

Washington, D. C, September 2, 1861 
Major-General Fremont. 

My dear Sir: Two points in your proclamation of 
August SO give me some anxiety. 

First. Should you shoot a man, according to the 
proclamation,* the Confederates would very certainly 
shoot our best men in their hands in retaliation ; and so, 
man for man, indefinitely. It is, therefore, my order 
that you allow no man to be shot under the proclamation 
without first having my approbation or consent. 

*Tn his emancipation proclamation, General Fremont an- 
nounced his intention of trying by court-martial all persons 
found with arms in their hands in opposition to the Union cause, 
and shooting them upon conviction. 



296 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Second. I think there is great danger that the closing 
paragraph, in relation to the confiscation of property 
and the liberating slaves of traitorous owners, will alarm 
our Southern Union friends and turn them against us; 
perhaps ruin our rather fair prospect for Kentucky. 
Allow me, therefore, to ask that you will, as of your 
own motion, modif}^ that paragraph so as to conform to 
the first and fourth sections of the act of Congress en- 
titled, "An act to confiscate property used for insurrec- 
tionary purposes," approved August 6, 1861, and a copy 
of which act I herewith send you. 

This letter is written in a spirit of caution, and not 
of censure. I send it by special messenger, in order 
that it may certainly and speedily reach you. 
Yours ver}^ truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Fremont's proclamation had caused great enthusiasm in the 
North. Lincoln's reply to it caused an equal burst of denun- 
ciation. There was talk of impeachment. Fremont became a 
popular idol, which may have been his intention in issuing the 
proclamation. Lowell wrote: "How many times are we to 
save Kentucky and lose self-respect?" Even Lincoln's close 
friends in many cases opposed his attitude, as is indicated by 
this letter to O. H. Browning, who was now filling the 
vacancy in the Senate from Illinois caused by the death of 
Stephen A. Douglas. 

TO O. H. BROWNING 
[Private and Confidential] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, September 22, 1861 
Hon. O. H. Browning. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 17th is just received; 
and coming from you, I confess it astonishes me. That 
you should object to my adhering to a law which you 
had assisted in making and presenting to me less than 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 297 

a month before is odd enough. But this is a very small 
part. Creneral Fremont's proclamation as to confiscation 
of prop(irty and the liberation of slaves is purely political 
and not within the range of military law or necessity. 
If a commanding general finds a necessity to seize the 
farm of a private owner for a pasture, an encampment, 
or a fortification, he has the right to do so, and to so 
hold it as long as the necessity lasts; and this is within 
military law, because within military necessity. But to 
say the farm shall no longer belong to the owner, or 
his heirs forever, and this as well when the farm is not 
needed for military purposes as when it is, is purely 
political, without the savor of military law about it. 
And the same is true of slaves. If the general needs 
them, he can seize them and use them; but when the 
need is past, it is not for him to fix their permanent 
future condition. That must be settled according to laws 
made by lawmakers, and not by military proclamations. 
The proclamation in the point in question is simply 
"dictatorship." It assumes that the general may do 
anything he pleases — confiscate the lands and' free the 
slaves of loyal people, as well as of disloyal ones. And 
going the whole figure, I have no doubt, would be more 
popular with some thoughtless people than that which 
has been done ! But I cannot assume this reckless posi- 
tion, nor allow others to assume it on my responsibility. 
You speak of it as being the only means of saving the 
government. On the contrarj'-, it is itself the surrender 
of the government. Can it be pretended that it is any 
longer the Government of the United States — any gov- 
ernment of constitution and laws — wherein a general 
or a president may make permanent rules of property 
by proclamation? I do not say Congress might not with 
propriety pass a law on the point, just such as General 
Fremont proclaimed. I do not say I might not, as a 
member of Congress, vote for it. What I object to is,, 
that I, as President, shall expressly or impliedly seize 



298 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and exercise the permanent legislative functions of the 
government. 

So much as to principle. Now as to policy. No doubt 
the thing was popular in some quarters^, and would have 
been more so if it had been a general declaration of 
emancipation. The Kentucky legislature would not budge 
till that proclamation was modified ; and General Ander- 
son telegraphed me that on the news of General Fremont 
having actually issued deeds of manumission, a whole 
company of our volunteers threw down their arms and 
disbanded. I was so assured as to think it probable 
that the very arms we had furnished Kentucky would 
be turned against us. I think to lose Kentucky is nearly 
the same as to lose the whole game. Kentucky gone, we 
cannot hold Missouri, nor, as I think^ Maryland. These 
all against us, and the job on our hands is too large 
for us. We would as well consent to separation at once, 
including the surrender of this capital. On the con- 
trary, if you will give up your restlessness for new 
positions, and back me manfully on the grounds upon 
which you and other kind friends gave me the election 
and have approved in my public documents, we shall go 
through triumphantly. You must not understand I took 
my course on the proclamation because of Kentucky. I 
took the same ground in a private letter to General 
Fremont before I heard from Kentucky. 

You think I am inconsistent because I did not also 
forbid General Fremont to shoot men under the procla- 
mation. I understand that part to be within military 
law, but I also think, and so privately wrote General 
Fremont, that it is impolitic in this, that our adversaries 
have the power^ and will certainly exercise it, to shoot 
as many of our men as we shoot of theirs. I did not 
say this in the public letter, because it is a subject I 
prefer not to discuss in the hearing of our enemies. 

There has been no thought of removing General Fre- 
mont on any ground connected with his proclamation, 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 299 

and if there has been any wish for his removal on any- 
ground, our mutual friend Sam. Glover can probably 
tell you what it was. I hope no real necessity for it 
exists on any ground. 

Your frien(5, as ever, 

A. Lincoln 

In the midst of the growing burden of the war, Lincoln 
found solace in his sense of humor which appeared not only 
in his famous anecdotes but also crept into his letters. 

TO MAJOR RAMSEY 

Executive Mansion, October 17, 1861 
My dear Sir: The lady bearer of this says she has 
two sons who want to work. Set them at it if possible. 
Wanting to work is so rare a want that it should be 
encouraged. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

When Congress met in regular session in December, 1861, 
Lincoln in his message made a preliminary suggestion of a 
plan very dear to his heart, that of compensated emancipa- 
tion with the colonization of the negroes. Later this was much 
more developed. With all his horror of slavery, Lincoln had 
no illusions about the negroes in the mass. He stated his 
opinion on the subject clearly in the debates with Douglas and 
there is no indication that he ever changed it. At Ottawa he 
said: 

"I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality 
between the white and the black races. There is a physical 
difference between the two, which, in my judgment, will prob- 
ably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of 
perfect equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that 
there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in 
favor of the race to which I belong having the superior posi- 
tion. I have never said anything to the contrary, but I hold 
that, notwithstanding all this, there is no reason in the world 



300 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumer- 
ated in the Declaration of Independence — the right to life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as 
much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge 
Douglas he is not my equal in many respects — certainly not in 
color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowment. But in 
the right to eat the bread, without the leave of anybody else, 
which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of 
Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man." At 
Charleston he said: "I will say that I am not, or ever have 
been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and 
political equality of the white and black races — that I am 
not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors 
of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to inter- 
marry with white people; and I will say in addition to this 
that there is a physical difference between the white and black 
races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living 
together on terms of social and political equality." 

It was Lincoln's hope by this plan of colonization, which he 
had first suggested in 1857, to settle not only the question of 
slavery, but also the race question which he clearly foresaw. 

EXTRACT FROM ANNUAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS 
[December 3, 1861] 

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of 
Representatives: In the midst of unprecedented 
political troubles we have cause of great gratitude to 
God for unusual good health and most abundant harvests. 

Under and by virtue of the act of Congress entitled 
**An act to confiscate property used for insurrectionary 
purposes/' approved August 6, 1861, the legal claims of 
certain persons to the labor and service of certain other 
persons have become forfeited ; and numbers of the 
latter^ thus liberated, are already dependent on the 
United States, and must be provided for in some way. 
Besides this, it is not impossible that some of the states 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 30I 

will pass similar enactments for their own benefit re- 
spectively, and by operation of which persons of the 
same class will be thrown upon them for disposal. In 
such case I recommend that Congress provide for ac- 
cepting such persons from such states, according to some 
mode of valuation, in lieu, pro tanto,^ of direct taxes, 
or upon some other plan to be agreed on with such 
states respectively, that such persons, on such acceptance 
by the General Government, be at once deemed free; 
and, that, in any event, steps be taken for colonizing 
both classes (or the one first mentioned, if the other 
shall not be brought into existence) at some place or 
places in a climate congenial to them. It might be well 
to consider^ too, whether the free colored people already 
in the United States could not, so far as individuals may 
desire, be included in such colonization. 

To carry out the plan of colonization may involve the 
acquiring of territory, and also the appropriation of 
money beyond that to be expended in the territorial 
acquisition. Having practiced the acquisition of terri- 
tory for nearly sixty years, the question of constitutional 
power to do so is no longer an open one with us. The 
power was questioned at first by Mr. Jefferson, who, 
however, in the purchase of Louisiana, yielded his 
scruples on the plea of great expediency. If it be said 
that the only legitimate object of acquiring territory is 
to furnish homes for white men, this measure effects that 
object; for the emigration of colored men leaves addi- 
tional room for white men remaining or coming here. 
Mr. Jefferson, however, placed the importance of pro- 
curing Louisiana more on political and commercial 
grounds than on providing room for population. 

On this whole proposition, including the appropriation 
of money with the acquisition of territory, does not the 
expediency amount to absolute necessity — that without 
which the government itself cannot be perpetuated? 

* To that extent. 



302 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

The war continues. In considering the policy to be 
adopted for suppressing the insurrection, I have been 
anxious and careful that the inevitable conflict for this 
purpose shall not degenerate into a violent and remorse- 
less revolutionary struggle. I have, therefore, in every 
case thought it proper to keep the integrity of the Union 
prominent as the primary object of the contest on our 
part, leaving all questions which are not of vital military 
importance to the more deliberate action of the legis- 
lature. 

In the exercise of my best discretion I have adhered 
to the blockade of the ports held by the insurgents, in- 
stead of putting in force, by proclamation, the law of 
Congress enacted at the last session for closing ports.* 

So also, obeying the dictates of prudence as well as 
the obligations of law, instead of transcending I have 
adhered to the act of Congress to confiscate property 
used for insurrectionary purposes. If a new law upon 
the same subject shall be proposed, its propriety will 
be duly considered. The Union must be preserved; and 
hence all indispensable means must be employed. We 
should not be in haste to determine that radical and 
extreme measures, which may reach the loyal as well 
as the disloyal, are indispensable. 

The inaugural address at the beginning of the admin- 
istration, and the message to Congress at the late special 
session, were both mainly devoted to the domestic con- 
troversy out of which the insurrection and consequent 
war have sprung. Nothing now occurs to add or subtract, 
to or from, the principles or general purposes stated and 
expressed in those documents. 

The last ray of hope for preserving the Union peace- 
ably expired at the assault upon Fort Sumter; and a 

* As has heen noted (see pa.^e 283) Lincoln's action in pro- 
claiming- a blockade of the Southern ports was regarded by many 
people in the North as a recognition of secession as a legal and 
accomplished fact. Accordingly Congress passed a law closmg 
the ports, which Lincoln ignored, as he here explains. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 303 

general review of what has occured since may not be 
unprofitable. What was painfully uncertain then is 
much better defined and more distinct now; and the 
progress of events is plainly in the right direction. The 
insurgents confidently claimed a strong support from 
north of Mason and Dixon's line; and the friends of 
the Union were not free from apprehension on the point. 
This, however^ was soon settled definitely, and on the 
right side. South of the line, noble little Delaware led 
off right from the first. Maryland was made to seem 
against the Union. Our soldiers were assaulted, bridges 
were burned, and railroads torn up within her limits, 
and we were many days, at one time, without the ability 
to bring a single regiment over her soil to the capital. 
Now her bridges and railroads are repaired and open to 
the government ; she already gives seven regiments to the 
cause of the Union and none to the enemy; and her 
people, at a regular election, have sustained the Union 
by a larger majority and a larger aggregate vote than 
they ever before gave to any candidate or any question. 
Kentucky, too, for some time in doubt, is now decidedly, 
and, I think, unchangeably, ranged on the side of the 
Union. Missouri is comparatively quiet, and, I believe, 
cannot again be overrun by the insurrectionists. These 
three states of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri, 
neither of which would promise a single soldier at first, 
have now an aggregate of not less than forty thousand 
in the field for the Union, while of their citizens cer- 
tainly not more than a third of that number, and they 
of doubtful whereabouts and doubtful existence, are in 
arms against it. After a somewhat bloody struggle of 
months, winter closes on the Union people of west- 
ern Virginia, leaving them masters of their own 
country. 

It continues to develop that the insurrection is largely, 
if not exclusively, a war upon the first principle of 



304 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

popular government — the rights of the people. Con- 
clusive evidence of this is found in the most grave and 
maturely considered public documents as well as in the 
general tone of the insurgents. In those documents we 
find the abridgment of the existing right of suffrage 
and the denial to the people of all right to participate in 
the selection of public officers except the legislative, 
boldly advocated, with labored arguments to prove that 
large control of the people in government is the source 
of all political evil. Monarchy itself is sometimes 
hinted at as a possible refuge from the power of the 
people."^ 

In my present position I could scarcely be justified 
were I to omit raising a warning voice against this 
approach of returning despotism. 

It is not needed nor fitting here that a general argu- 
ment should be made in favor of popular institutions; 
but there is one point, with its connections, not so 
hackneyed as most others, to which I ask a brief atten- 
tion. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing 
with, if not above, labor, in the structure of government. 
It is assumed that labor is available only in connection 
with capital; that nobody labors unless somebody else, 
owning capital, somehow by the use of it induces him 
to labor. This assumed, it is next considered whether 
it is best that capital shall hire laborers, and thus induce 
them to work by their own consent, or buy them and 
drive them to it without their consent. Having pro- 
ceeded thus far, it is naturally concluded that all laborers 
are either hired laborers or what we call slaves. And, 
further, it is assumed that whoever is once a hired 
laborer is fixed in that condition for life. 

Now, there is no such relation between capital and 
labor as assumed, nor is there any such thing as a free 
man being fixed for life in the condition of a hired 

• Lincoln was mistaken in this. The Confederate government 
was as clearly popular as that of the United States. 






SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 305 

laborer. Both these assumptions are false, and all in- 
ferences from them are groundless. 

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital 
is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed 
if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of 
capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. 
Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection 
as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and 
probably always will be, a relation between labor and 
capital producing mutual benefits. The error is in as- 
suming that the whole labor of the community exists 
within that relation. A few men own capital, and that 
few avoid labor themselves, and with their capital hire 
or buy another few to labor for them. A large majority 
belong to neither class — neither work for others nor 
have others working for them. In most of the Southern 
states a majority of the whole people, of all colors, are 
neither slaves nor masters; while in the Northern a 
large majority are neither hirers nor hired. Men with 
their families — wives, sons, and daughters — work for 
themselves, on their farms, in their houses, and in their 
shops^ taking the whole product to themselves, and ask- 
ing no favors of capital on the one hand, nor of hired 
laborers or slaves on the other. It is not forgotten that 
a considerable number of persons mingle their own labor 
with capital — that is, they labor with their own hands 
and also buy or hire others to labor for them; but this 
is only a mixed and not a distinct class. No principle 
stated is disturbed by the existence of this mixed class. 

Again, as has already been said, there is not, of neces- 
sity, any such thing as the free hired laborer being fixed 
to that condition for life. Many independent men every- 
where in these states, a few years back in their lives, 
were hired laborers. The prudent, penniless beginner 
in the world labors for wages a while, saves a surplus 
with which to buy tools or land for himself, then labors 
on his own account another while, and at length hires 



306 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

another new beginner to help him. This is the just and 
generous and prosperous system which opens the way 
to all — gives hope to all, and consequent energy and 
progress and improvement of condition to all. No men 
living are more worthy to be trusted than those who toil 
up from poverty — none less inclined to take or touch 
aught which they have not honestly earned. Let them 
beware of surrendering a political power which they 
already possess, and which, if surrendered, will surely 
be used to close the door of advancement against such 
as they, and to fix new disabilities and burdens upon 
them, till all of liberty shall be lost. 

From the first taking of our national census to the 
last are seventy years; and we find our population at 
the end of the period eight times as great as it was at 
the beginning. The increase of those other things which 
men deem desirable has been even greater. We thus 
have, at one view, what the popular principle, applied 
to government, through the machinery of the states and 
the Union has produced in a given time; and also what, 
if firmly maintained, it promises for the future. There 
are already among us those who, if the Union be pre- 
served, will live to see it contain 250,000,000 * The 
struggle of today is not altogether for today — it is for 
a vast future also. With a reliance on Providence all 
the more firm and earnest, let us proceed in the great 
task which events have devolved upon us. 

Abraham Lincoln 

The message was generally approved. The following com- 
ment from Harper's Weekly is an interesting example. "The 
President is an honest, plain, shrewd magistrate. He is not a 
brilliant orator; he is not a great leader." 

All during the war Lincoln had, in addition to his other 
burdens, the necessity of soothing and healing the tender sen- 
sibilities of jealous military men. It was not a pleasant task, 
as may be judged from this letter: 

* This was of course greatly overestimated. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 307 

TO GENERAL DAVID HUNTER 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, December SI, 1861 
Major-General Hunter. 

Dear Sir: Yours of the 23d is received, and I am 
constrained to say it is difficult to answer so ugly a letter 
in good temper. I am, as you intimate, losing much of 
the great confidence I placed in you, not from any act 
or omission of yours touching the public service, up to 
the time you were sent to Leavenworth, but from the 
flood of grumbling dispatches and letters I have seen 
from you since. I knew you were being ordered to 
Leavenworth at the time it was done; and I aver that 
with as tender a regard for your honor and your sensi- 
bilities as I had for my own, it never occurred to me 
that you were being "humiliated, insulted, and dis- 
graced !" nor have I, up to this day, heard an intimation 
that you have been wronged, coming from anyone but 
yourself. No one has blamed you for the retrograde, 
movement from Springfield, nor for the information you 
gave General Cameron; and this you could readily under- 
stand, if it were not for your unwarranted assumption 
that the ordering you to Leavenworth must necessarily 
have been done as a punishment for some fault. I 
thought then, and think yet, the position assigned to you 
is as responsible, and as honorable, as that assigned to 
Buell — I know that General McClellan expected more 
important results from it. My impression is that at the 
time you were assigned to the new Western Department, 
it had not been determined to replace General Sherman 
in Kentucky; but of this I am not certain, because the 
idea that a command in Kentucky was very desirable, 
and one in the farther West undesirable, had never 
occurred to me. You constantlv speak of being placed 
in command of only S,000. Now tell me, is this not 
mere impatience? Have you not known all the while 
that you are to command four or five times that many? 



308 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I have been, and am sincerely your friend; and if, as 
such, I dare to make a suggestion, I would say you are 
adopting the best possible way to ruin yourself. "Act 
well your part, there all the honor lies." * He who 
does something at the head of one regiment, will eclipse 
him who does nothing at the head of a hundred. 
Your friend, as ever, 

A. Lincoln 

In addition, he was compelled to take part in the framing 
of military plans and was constantly in correspondence with 
General George B. McClellan, who commanded the Army of 
the Potomac, and whom Lincoln was trying to induce to 
become more aggressive. The following is a characteristic 
letters 

TO GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, February 3, 1862 
Major-General McClellan. 

My dear Sir: You and I have distinct and different 
plans for a movement of the Army of the Potomac — 
yours to be down the Chesapeake, up the Rappahannock 
to Urbana, and across land to the terminus of the rail- 
road on the York River; mine to move directly to a 
point on the railroad southwest of Manassas. 

If you will give me satisfactory answers to the fol- 
lowing questions, I shall gladly yield my plan to yours. 

First. Does not your plan involve a greatly larger 
expenditure of time and money than mine.^ 

Second. Wherein is a victory more certain by your 
plan than mine? 

Third. Wherein is a victory more valuable by your 
plan than mine? 

* Pope, Essay on Man, Ep. IV, Line 193. 

"Honor and shame from no condition rise. 
Act well your part, there all the honor lies." 



\ 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 399 

Fourth. In fact, would it not be less valuable in 
this, that it would break no great line of the enemy's 
communications, while mine would? 

Fifth. In case of disaster, would not a retreat be 
more difficult by your plan than mine? 
Yours truly, 

Abraham Lincoln 

Memorandum Accompanying Letter of President Lincoln 
to General McClellan, Dated February 3, 1862 

First. Suppose the enemy should attack us in force 
before we reach the Occoquan, M'hat? 

Second. Suppose the enemy in force shall dispute 
the crossing of the Occoquan, what? In view of this, 
might it not be safest for us to cross the Occoquan at 
Colchester, rather than at the village of Occoquan ? This 
would cost the enemy two miles more of travel to meet 
us, but would, on the contrary, leave us two miles farther 
from, our ultimate destination. 

Third. Suppose we reach Maple Valley without an 
attack, will we not be attacked there in force by the 
enemy marching by the several roads from Manassas; 
and if so, what? 

In March, 1862, satisfied that he had public support behind 
!iim, Lincoln renewed his suggestion for compensated emanci- 
pntion in a special message to Congress. 

SPECIAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS 
[March 6, 1863] 
Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of 
Representatives: I recommend the adoption of a joint 
resolution by your honorable bodies, which shall be sub- 
stantially as follows: 

Resolved, That the United States ought to cooperate 
with any state which may adopt gradual abolishment of 



310 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

slavery, giving to such state pecuniary aid, to be used 
by such statC;, in its discretion, to compensate for the 
inconveniences, public and private, produced by such 
change of system. 

If the proposition contained in the resolution does not 
meet the approval of Congress and the country, there is 
the end ; but if it does command such approval, I deem 
it of importance that the states and people immediately 
interested should be at once distinctly notified of the 
fact, so that they may begin to consider whether to 
accept or reject it. The federal government would find 
its highest interest in such a measure, as one of the most 
efficient means of self-preservation. The leaders of the 
existing insurrection entertain the hope that this gov- 
ernment will ultimately be forced to acknowledge the 
independence of some part of the disaffected region, and 
that all the slave states north of such part will then say, 
"The Union for which we have struggled being already 
gone, we now choose to go with the Southern section." 
To deprive them of this hope substantially ends the 
rebellion ; and the initiation of emancipation completely 
deprives them of it as to all the states initiating it. 
The point is not that all the states tolerating slavery 
would very soon, if at all, initiate emancipation; but 
that while the offer is equally made to all, the more 
Northern shall, by such initiation, make it certain to 
the more Southern that in no event will the former ever 
join the latter in their proposed confederacy. I say 
"initiation" because, in my judgment, gradual and not 
sudden emancipation is better for all. In the mere 
financial or pecuniary view, any member of Congress, 
with the census tables and treasury reports before him, 
can readily see for himself how very soon the current 
expenditures of this war would purchase, at fair valu- 
ation, all the slaves in any named state. Such a proposi- 
tion on the part of the general government sets up no 
claim of a right by federal authority to interfere with 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 311 

slavery within state limits, referring, as it does, the 
absolute control of the subject in each case to the state 
and its people immediately interested. It is proposed 
as a matter of perfectly free choice with them. 

In the annual message, last December, I thought fit 
to say, "The Union must be preserved, and hence all 
indispensable means must be employed." I said this 
not hastily, but deliberately. War has been made, and 
continues to be, an indispensable means to this end. A 
practical reacknowledgment of the national authority 
would render the war unnecessary, and it would at once 
cease. If, however^ resistance continues, the war must 
also continue; and it is impossible to foresee all the 
incidents which may attend and all the ruin which may 
follow it. Such as may seem indispensable, or may 
obviously promise great efficiency, toward ending the 
struggle, must and will come. 

The proposition now made, though an offer only, I 
hope it may be esteemed no offense to ask whether the 
pecuniary consideration tendered would not be of more 
value to the states and private persons concerned than 
are the institution and property in it, in the present 
aspect of affairs? 

While it is true that the adoption of the proposed 
resolution would be merely initiatory, and not within 
itself a practical measure, it is recommended in the hope 
that it would soon lead to important practical results. 
In full view of my great responsibility to my God and 
to my country, I earnestly beg the attention of Congress 
and the people to the subject. 

Abraham Lincoln 

The proposition proved popular; Lincoln received many 
letters of endorsement, and newspaper comment was generally 
favorable. The following: letter to the editor of the New York 
Times shows how Lincoln kept behind any plan he was desir- 
ous of carrying through: 



312 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO HENRY J. RAYMOND 

[P^'ivate] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, March 9, 1862 
Hon. Henry J. Raymond. 

My dear Sir: I am grateful to the New York jour- 
nals, and not less so to the Times than to others, for 
their kind notices of the late special message to Con- 
gress. 

Your paper, however, intimates that the proposition, 
though well intentioned, must fail on the score of 
expense. I do hope you will reconsider this. Have 
you noticed the facts that less than one-half day's cost 
of this war v/ould pay for all the slaves in Delaware at 
$400 per head — that eighty-seven days' cost of this 
war would pay for all in Delaware, Maryland, District 
of Columbia, Kentucky, and Missouri at the same price? 
Were those states to take the step, do you doubt that it 
would shorten the war more than eighty-seven days, and 
thus be an actual saving of expense.'^ 

^ Please look at these things and consider whether 
there should not be another article in the Times. 
Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

The difficulties with General McClellan continued as the 
spring advanced. Lincoln was very patient, but at times even 
his patience was strained. 

TO GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN 

Washington, April 9, 1862 
Major-General McClellan. 

My dear Sir: Your dispatches, complaining that you 
are not properly sustained, while they do not offend me, 
do pain me very much. 

Blenker's division was withdrawn from you before 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 313 

you left here, and you knew the pressure under which 
I did it, and, as I thought, acquiesced in it — certainly 
not without reluctance. 

After you left I ascertained that less than 20,000 
unorganized men, without a single field-battery, were all 
you designed to be left for the defense of Washington 
and Manassas Junction, and part of this even was to 
go to General Hooker's old position; General Bank's 
corps, once designed for Manassas Junction, was divided 
and tied up on the line of Winchester and Strasburg, 
and could not leave it without again exposing the upper 
Potomac and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. This 
presented (or would present, when McDowell and Sum- 
ner should be gone) a great temptation to the enemy to 
turn back from the Rappahannock and sack Washing- 
ton. My explicit order that Washington should, by the 
judgment of all the commanders of corps, be left entirely 
secure, had been neglected. It was precisely this that 
drove me to detain McDowell. 

T do not forget that I was satisfied with your arrange- 
ment to leave Banks at iSIanassas Junction; but when 
that arrangement was broken up and nothing was sub- 
stituted for it, of course I was not satisfied. I was 
constrained to substitute something for it myself. 

And now allow me to ask, do you really think I should 
permit the line from Richmond via Manassas Junction 
to this city to be entirely open, except what resistance 
could be presented by less than 20,000 unorganized 
troops? This is a question which the country will not 
allow me to evade. 

There is a curious mystery about the number of the 
troops now with you. When I telegraphed you on the 
6th, saying you had over 100,000 with you, I had just 
obtained from the Secretary of War a statement, taken 
as he said from your own returns, making 108,000 then 
with you and en route to you. You now say you will 
have but 85,000 when all en route to you shall have 



314 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

reached you. How can this discrepancy of 23,000 be 
accounted for? 

As to General Wool's command, I understand it is 
doing for you precisely what a like number of your own 
would have to do if that command was away. I sup- 
pose the whole force which has gone forward to you is 
with you by this time; and if so, I think it is the precise 
time for you to strike a blow. By delay the enemy will 
relatively gain upon you — that is, he will gain faster by 
fortifications and reenforcements than you can by 
reenforcements alone. 

And once more let me tell you it is indispensable to 
you that you strike a blow. I am powerless to help 
this. You will do me the justice to remember I always 
insisted that going down the bay in search of a field, 
instead of fighting at or near Manassas, was only shift- 
ing and not surmounting a difficulty; that we would find 
the same enemy and the same or equal entrenchments at 
either place. The country will not fail to note — is not- 
ing now — that the present hesitation to move upon an 
entrenched enemy is but the story of Manassas repeated. 

I beg to assure you that I have never written you or 
spoken to you in greater kindness of feeling than now, 
nor with a fuller purpose to sustain you, so far as in 
my most anxious judgment I consistently can; but you 
must act. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 



The pressure for military appointments, tremendous at the 
opening of the war, was replaced in 1862 by a similar one for 
promotion. General John Pope, who was in command of a 
Union force in Missouri had forced the Confederates to aban- 
don strong defenses at New Madrid and to surrender Island 
No. 10. This made much easier the task of obtaining control 
of the Mississippi. Instant demand for the promotion of Gen- 
eral Pope was made, and Ivincoln thus replied: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 315 

TO R. YATES AND WILLIAM BUTLER 

[Telegram] 

Washington, April 10, 1862 
Hon. R. Yates and William Butler, Springfield, Illinois: 
I fully appreciate General Pope's splendid achieve- 
ments, with their invaluable results; but you must know 
that majorr-generalships in the regular army are not as 
plenty as blackberries. 

A. Lincoln 

In May, General David Hunter, a personal friend of Lin- 
coln's, who was commander of the Department of the East, in 
spite of his intimate knowledge of what had befallen Fremont, 
issued an order declaring, "Slavery and martial law in a free 
country are altogether incompatible; the persons in . . . 
Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina, heretofore held as 
slaves, are therefore declared forever free." 

Lincoln first heard of this through the newspapers. He at 
once issued the following proclamation: 

PROCLAMATION REVOKING GENERAL HUNTER'S 
ORDER OF MILITARY EMANCIPATION 

[May 19, 1862] 

Whereas there appears in the public prints what pur- 
ports to be a proclamation of Major-General Hunter, in 
the words and figures following, to wit: 

"Headquarters Department of the South. 
"Hilton Head, Port Royal, S. C, May 9, 1862 
"The three states of Georgia, Florida, and South 
Carolina, comprising the military department of the 
South, having deliberately declared themselves no 
longer under the protection of the United States of 
America, and having taken up arms against the said 
United States, it became a military necessity to declare 
martial law. This was accordingly done on the 25th 
day of April, 1862. Slavery and martial law in a free 



316 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

country are altogether incompatible; the persons in 
these three States — Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina 
■ — heretofore held as slaves, are therefore declared for- 
ever free. 

"By command of Major-General D. Hunter: 
"(Official.) Ed. W. Smith, Acting Assistant Adjut- 
ant-General." • 

And whereas the same is producing some excitement 
and misunderstanding: therefore, 

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, 
proclaim and declare that the Government of the United 
States had no knovrledge, information, or belief of an 
intention on the part of General Hunter to issue such a 
proclamation; nor has it yet any authentic information 
that the document is genuine. And further, that neither 
General Hunter, nor any other commander or person, 
has been authorized by the Government of the United 
States to make a proclamation declaring the slaves of 
any state free ; and that the supposed proclamation now 
in question, whether genuine or false, is altogether void 
so far as respects such a declaration. 

I further make known that, whether it be competent 
for me, as commander-in-chief of the army and nav}?", to 
declare the slaves of any state or states free, and 
whether, at any time, in any case, it shall have become a 
necessity indispensable to the maintenance of the gov- 
ernment to exercise such supposed power, are questions 
which, under my responsibility, I reserve to myself, and 
which I cannot feel justified in leaving to the decision 
of commanders in the field. These are totally different 
questions from those of police regulations in armies and 
camps. 

On the sixth day of March last, by special message, I 
recommended to Congress the adoption of a joint reso- 
lution, to be substantially as follows: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 317 

"Resolved^ That the United States ought to cooperate 
with any state which may adopt gradual abolishment of 
slavery, giving to such state pecuniary aid, to be used 
by such state, in its discretion, to compensate for the 
inconvenience, public and private, produced by such 
change of system." 

The resolution, in the language above quoted, was 
adopted by large majorities in both branches of Con- 
gress, and now stands an authentic, definite, and solemn 
proposal of the nation to the states and people most 
immediately interested in the subject-matter. To the 
people of those states I now earnestly appeal. I do 
not argue — I beseech you to make arguments for your- 
selves. You cannot, if you would, be blind to the signs 
of the times. I beg of you a calm and enlarged con- 
sideration of them, ranging, if it may be, far above 
personal and partisan politics. This proposal makes 
common cause for a common object, casting no reproaches 
upon any. It acts not the Pharisee. The change it 
contemplates would come gently as the dews of heaven, 
not rending or wrecking anything. Will you not 
embrace it? So much good has not been done, by one 
effort, in all past time, as in the providence of God it is 
now your high privilege to do. May the vast future not 
have to lament that you have neglected it. 
In witness, etc., 

Abraham Lincoln 
By the President: 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State 

To Lincoln's sorrow and disappointment the senators and 
representatives from the Border states paid no attention to 
his suggestion for compensated emancipation. In July he 
asked them to the AVhite House and addressed them briefly on 
the subject. 



318 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

APPEAL TO THE BORDER STATE 

REPRESENTATIVES FOR COMPENSATED 

EMANCIPATION 

[July 12, 1862] 

Gentlemen: After the adjournment of Congress, 
now very near, I shall have no opportunity of seeing 
you for several months. Believing that you of the Bor- 
der states hold more power for good than any other 
equal number of members, I feel it a duty which I can- 
not justifiably waive to make this appeal to you. I 
intend no reproach or complaint when I assure you that, 
in my opinion, if you all had voted for the resolution in 
the gradual-emancipation message of last March, the 
war would now be substantially ended. And the plan 
therein proposed is yet one of the most potent and swift 
means of ending it. Let the states which are in rebel- 
lion see definitely and certainly that in no event will the 
states you represent ever join their proposed con- 
federacy, and they cannot much longer maintain the con- 
test. But you cannot divest them of their hope to ulti- 
mately have you with them so long as you show a deter- 
mination to perpetuate the institution within your own 
states. Beat them at elections, as you have overwhelm- 
ingly done, and, nothing daunted, they still claim you 
as their own. You and I know what the lever of their 
power is. Break that lever before their faces, and they 
can shake you no more forever. Most of you have 
treated me with kindness and consideration, and I trust 
you will not now think I improperly touch what is exclu- 
sively your own, when, for the sake of the whole country, 
I ask. Can you, for your states, do better than to take 
the course I urge? Discarding punctilio and maxims 
adapted to more manageable times, and looking only to 
the unprecedentedly stern facts of our case, can you do 
better in any possible event? You prefer that the con- 
stitutional relation of the states to the nation shall be 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 319 

practically restored without disturbance of the institu- 
tion; and if this were done, my whole duty in this 
respect, under the Constitution and my oath of office, 
would be performed. But it is not done, and we are 
tr^^ing to accomplish it by war. The incidents of the 
war cannot be avoided. If the war continues long, as it 
must if the object is not sooner attained, the institution 
in your states will be extinguished by mere friction and 
abrasion — by the mere incidents of war. It will be 
gone and you will have nothing valuable in lieu of it. 
Much of its value is gone already. How much better 
for you and for your people to take the step which at 
once shortens the war and secures substantial compensa- 
tion for that which is sure to be wholly lost in any other 
event! How much better to thus save the money which 
else we sink forever in the war! How much better to 
do it while we can, lest the war ere long render us 
pecuniarily unable to do it! How much better for you 
as seller, and the nation as buyer, to sell out and buy 
out that without which the war could have never been, 
than to sink both the thing to be sold and the price of 
it in cutting one another's throats ! 

I do not speak of emancipation at once, but of a 
decision at once to emancipate gradually. Room in 
South America for colonization can be obtained cheaply 
and in abundance, and when numbers shall be large 
enough to be company and encouragement for one 
another, the freed people will not be so reluctant to go. 

I am pressed with a difficulty not yet mentioned — one 
which threatens division among those who, united, are 
none too strong. An instance of it is known to you. 
General Hunter is an honest man. He was, and I hope, 
still is, my friend. I valued him none the less for his 
agreeing with me in the general wish that all men every- 
where could be free. He proclaimed all men free within 
certain states, and I repudiated the proclamation. He 
expected more good and less harm from the measure 



320 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

than I could believe would follow. Yet, in repudiating 
it, 1 gave dissatisfaction, if not offense, to many whose 
support the country cannot afford to lose. And this is 
not the end of it. The pressure in this direction is 
still upan me, and is increasing. By conceding what 
I now ask^ you can relieve me, and, much more, can 
relieve the country, in this important point. Upon 
these considerations I have again begged your attention 
to the message of March last. Before leaving the capi- 
tal, consider and discuss it among yourselves. You are 
patriots and statesmen, and as such I pray you consider 
this proposition, and at the least commend it to the con- 
sideration of your states and people. As you would 
perpetuate popular government for the best people in 
the world, I beseech you that you do in no wise omit 
this. Our common country is in great peril, demanding 
the loftiest views and boldest action to bring it speedy 
relief. Once relieved, its form of government is saved 
to the world, its beloved history and cherished memo- 
ries are vindicated, and its happy future fully assured 
and rendered inconceivably grand. To you, more than 
to any others, the privilege is given to assure that happi- 
ness and swell that grandeur, and to link your own 
names therewith forever. 

His audience was entirely friendly to him but unsympathetic 
toward his plan, possibly because they knew that sentiment at 
home would be opposed. In the meantime Congress had eman- 
cipated the slaves in the District of Columbia, appropriating 
one million dollars for the compensation of loyal owners, and 
one hundred thousand dollars to pay the expenses of such of 
the freedmen as wished to go to Liberia or Haiti. This was as 
far as Lincoln's plan was ever successful. 

In 1862 Lincoln appointed Colonel George F. Shepley, 
Andrew Johnson, and Edward Stanley military governors of 
Louisiana, Tennessee, and North Carolina respectively, with 
the hope of so stimulating Union sentiment in those states 
that governments loyal to the United States might be estab- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 321 

lished. It was the beginning of his policy of reconstruction. 
Almost immediately he received numerous protests against the 
policy followed in Louisiana. The situation there was dis- 
cussed in several notable letters. 



TO REVERDY JOHNSON 

[Private] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, July 26, 1862 
Hon, Reverdy Johnson. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 16th, by the hand of 
Governor Shepley, is received. It seems the Union 
feeling in Louisiana is being crushed out by the course 
of General Phelps.* Please pardon me for believing 
that is a false pretense. The people of Louisiana — all 
intelligent people everywhere — know full well that I 
never had a wish to touch the foundations of their 
society, or any right of theirs. With perfect knowledge 
of this they forced a necessity upon me to send armies 
among them, and it is their own fault, not mine, that 
they are annoyed by the presence of General Phelps. 
They also know the remedy — know how to be cured of 
General Phelps. Remove the necessity for his presence. 
And might it not be well for them to consider whether 
they have not already had time enough to do this? If 
they can conceive of anything worse than General 
Phelps within my power, would they not better be look- 
ing out for it.^ They very well know the wvay to avert 
all this is S'im^ply to take their place in the Union upon 
the old terms. If they will not do this, should they not 
receive harder blows rather than lighter ones .^ You 
are ready to say I apply to friends what is due only to 
enemies. I distrust the wisdom if not the sincerity of 
friends who would hold my hands while my enemies stab 
me. This appeal of professed friends has paralyzed me 

* General J. "W. Phelps vi-as actively engaged in recruiting 
negro troops in Louisiana witliout authority of law. 



322 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

more in this struggle than any other one thing. You 
remember telling me, the day after the Baltimore mob 
in April, 1861, that it would crush all Union feeling in 
Maryland for me to attempt bringing troops over Mary- 
land soil to Washington. I brought the troops not- 
withstanding, and yet there was Union feeling enough 
left to elect a legislature the next autumn, which in 
turn elected a very excellent Union United States sena- 
tor ! * I am a patient man — always willing to forgive 
on the Christian terms of repentance, and also to give 
ample time for repentance. Still, I must save this gov- 
ernment, if possible. What I cannot do, of course I 
will not do, but it may as well be understood, once for 
all, that I shall not surrender this game leaving any 
available card unplayed. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 



TO CUTHBERT BULLITT 

[Private] 

Washing-ton, D. C, July 28, 1862 
Cuthbert Bullitt, Esq., New Orleans, La. 

Sir: The copy of a letter addressed to yourself by 
Mr. Thomas J. Durant has been shown to me. The 
writer appears to be an able, a dispassionate, and an 
entirely sincere man. The first part of the letter is 
devoted to an effort to show that the secession ordinance 
of Louisiana was adopted against the will of a major- 
ity of the people. This is probably true, and in that 
fact may be found some instruction. Why did they 
allow the ordinance to go into effect ? Why did they not 
assert themselves? Why stand passive and allow them- 
selves to be trodden down by a minority? Why did 
they not hold popular meetings and have a convention 
of their own to express and enforce the true sentiment 

* Reverdy Johnson himself. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 323 

of the state? If preorganization was against them 
then, why not do this now that the United States army 
is present to protect them? The paralysis — the dead 
palsy — of the government in this whole struggle is that 
this class of men will do nothing for the government, 
nothing for themselves, except demanding that the gov- 
ernment shall not strike its open enemies lest they be 
struck by accident. 

Mr. Durant complains that in various ways the rela- 
tion of master and slave is disturbed by the presence of 
our army, and he considers it particularly vexatious that 
this, in part, is done under cover of an act of Congress, 
while constitutional guaranties are suspended on the plea 
of military necessity. The truth is that what is done 
and omitted about slaves is done and omitted on the 
same military necessity. It is a military necessity to 
have men and money; and we can get neither in suffi- 
cient numbers or amounts if we keep from or drive from 
our lines slaves coming to them. Mr. Durant cannot be 
ignorant of the pressure in this direction, nor of my 
efforts to hold it within bounds till he and such as he 
shall have time to help themselves. 

I am not posted to speak understandingly on all the 
police regulations of which Mr. Durant complains. If 
experience shows any one of them to be wrong, let them 
be set right. I think I can perceive in the freedom of 
trade which Mr. Durant urges that he would relieve 
both friends and enemies from the pressure of the block- 
ade. Bj^ this he would serve the enemy more effectively 
than the enemy is able to serve himself. I do not say 
or believe that to serve the enemy is the purpose of Mr. 
Durant, or that he is conscious of any purpose other 
than national and patriotic ones. Still, if there were a 
class of men who, having no choice of sides in the con- 
test, were anxious only to have quiet and comfort for 
themselves while it rages, and to fall in with the victori- 
ous side at the end of it v/ithout loss to themselves, their 



324 SELECTIOMS FROM LINCOLN 

advice as to the mode of conducting the contest would 
be precisely such as his is. He speaks of no duty — 
apparently thinks of none — resting upon Union men. 
He even thinks it injurious to the Union cause that they 
should be restrained in trade and passage without taking 
sides. They are to touch neither a sail nor a pump, but 
to be merely passengers — deadheads at that- — to be car- 
ried snug and dry throughout the storm, and safely 
landed right side up. Nay, more: even a mutineer is 
to go untouched, lest these sacred passengers receive an 
accidental wound. Of course the rebellion will never be 
suppressed in Louisiana if the professed Union men 
there will neither help to do it nor permit the govern- 
ment to do it without their help. Now, I think the 
true remedy is very different from what is suggested by 
Mr. Durant. It does not lie in rounding the rough 
angles of the war, but in removing the necessity for the 
war. The people of Louisiana who wish protection to 
person and property, have but to reach forth their hands 
and take it. Let them in good faith reinaugurate the 
national authority, and set up a state government con- 
forming thereto under the Constitution. They know 
how to do it, and can have the protection of the army 
while doing it. The army will be withdrawn as soon as 
such government can dispense with its presence, and 
the people of the state can then, upon the old constitu- 
tional terms, govern themselves to their own liking. 
This is very simple and easy. 

If they will not do this, if they prefer to hazard all 
for the sake of destroying the government, it is for them 
to consider whether it is probable that I will surrender 
the government to save them from losing all. If they 
decline what I suggest, you will scarcely need to ask 
what I will do. What would you do in my position? 
Would you drop the war where it is, or would you prose- 
cute it in future with elder-stalk squirts charged with 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 325 

rosewater? Would you deal lighter blows rather than 
heavier ones? Would you give up the contest, leaving 
any available means unapplied? 

I am in no boastful mood. I shall not do more than 
I can; and I shall do all I can to save the government, 
which is my sworn duty as well as my personal inclina- 
tion. I shall do nothing in malice. What I deal with 
is too vast for malicious dealing. 
Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

TO AUGUST BELMONT* 

[July 31, 1862] 

Dear Sir: You send to ^Ir. W an extract from a 

letter written at New Orleans the 9th instant, which is 
shown to me. You do not give the writer's name; but 
plainly he is a man of ability, and probably of some 
note. He says: "The time has arrived when Mr. Lin- 
coln must take a decisive course. Trying to please every- 
body, he will satisfy nobody. A vacillating policy in 
matters of importance is the very worst. Now is the 
time, if ever, for honest men who love their country to 
rally to its support. Why will not the North say offi- 
cially that it wishes for the restoration of the Union as 
it was?" 

And so, it seems, this is the point on which the writer 
thinks I have no policy. Why will he not read and 
understand what I have said? 

The substance of the very declaration he desires is in 
the inaugural, in each of the two regular messages to 
Congress, and in many, if not all, the minor documents 
issued by the Executive since the Inauguration. 

Broken eggs cannot be mended; but Louisiana has 
nothing to do now but to take her place in the Union as 

*A prominent New York Democrat. 



326 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

it was^ barring the already broken eggs. "The sooner 
she does so^ the smaller will be the amount of that which 
will be past mending. This government cannot much 
longer play a game in whi'^'i it stakes all, and its ene- 
mies stake nothing. Those enemies must understand 
that they cannot experiment for ten years trying to de- 
stroy the government, and if they fail, still come back 
into the Union unhurt. If they expect in any contin- 
gency to ever have the Union as it was, I join with the 
writer in saying, "Now is the time." 

How much better it would have been for the writer to 
have gone at this, under the protection of the army at 
New Orleans, than to have sat down in a closet writing 
complaining letters northward ! 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In 'the summer of 1862 the cause of the Union was at its 
lowest ebb. The military campaign in Virginia, which was 
the only one in which the country was deeply interested, had 
been a disastrous failure. Dissatisfied with the plan for com- 
pensated emancipation, the radical opponents of slavery now 
demanded immediate emancipation by proclamation. The 
demand was very strong and the denunciation of the President 
by his opponents increasingly bitter. Lincoln had hinted to 
Seward and Welles, the day after the conference with the 
Border state representatives, that he might emancipate the 
slaves as a military measure by proclamation, and- finally on 
July 32 he read to his cabinet a proclamation announcing that 
he would OH January 1, 1863, as a measure of war, free the 
slaves in any states not then recognizing the authority of the 
United States. His amazed cabinet approved, but Seward 
suggested that if it were issued at the time it would be con- 
sidered the "last shriek" of the Government, and that it would 
be better tactics to wait for a military victoiy. Lincoln 
agreed, and a long wait for a victory followed. 

On August 20, Horace Greeley published in the editorial 
columns of the Trlbnne an open letter to President Lincoln, 
called "The Prayer of Twenty Million." It began: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 327 

"To Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States: 

"Dear Sir: I do not intrude to tell you — for you must 
know already — that a great proportion of those who triumphed 
in your election, and of all who desire the unqualified suppres- 
sion of the rebellion now desolating our country, are sorely 
disappointed and deeply pained by the policy you seem to be 
pursuing with regard to the slaves of rebels. I write you 
only to set succinctly and unmistakably before you what we 
require, what we think we have a right to expect, and of what 
we complain." 

The letter continued with a mixture of demands and accu- 
sations. Demanding that the President execute the laws, it 
accused him of being "strangely remiss" in the discharge of 
oflBcial and imperative duty with regard to the emancipation 
provisions of the confiscation acts; of being unduly influenced 
by the counsels, the representations, and the menaces of certain 
"fossil politicians" of the Border states, and warned him that 
timid counsels were perilous, and that the Union cause was 
sufPering from mistaken deference to "rebel slavery." It 
went so far as to say, "You never give a direction to your 
military subordinates which does not appear to have been 
conceived in the interest of Slavery rather than that of Free- 
dom." It closed, "I entreat you to render hearty and un- 
equivocal obedience to the laws of the land." 

Lincoln's reply is one of the most remarkable letters of 
history, not only for its dignity and restraint, its eflPectiveness 
and logic, but also for the power of its expression and its 
revelation of his purpose. It is all the more remarkable when 
it is remembered that the Emancipation Proclamation was all 
the while in his desk. 



TO HORACE GREELEY 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, August 22, 1862 

Hon. Horace Greeley. 

Dear Sir: I have just read yours of the 19th, 

addressed to myself through the New York Tribune. 

If there be in it any statements or assumptions of fact 

which I may know to be erroneous, I do not, now and 



328 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

here, controvert them. If there be in it any inferences 
which I may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not, now 
and here, argue against them. If there be perceptible 
in it an impatient and dictatorial tone, I waive it in 
deference to an old friend, whose heart I have always 
supposed to be right. 

As to the policy I "seem to be pursuing," as you 
say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt. 

I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest 
way under the Constitution. The sooner the national 
authority can be restored, the nearer the Union will be 
"the Union as it was." If there be those who would 
not save the Union unless they could at the same time 
save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be 
those who would not save the Union unless they could 
at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with 
them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save 
the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. 
If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I 
would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the 
slaves, I would do it ; and if I could save it by freeing 
some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. 
What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do 
because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I 
forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help 
to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall 
believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do 
more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the 
cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be 
errors, and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall 
appear to be true views. I have here stated my purpose 
according to my view of official duty, and I intend no 
modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all 
men, everywhere, could be free. 
Yours, 

A. Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 329 

Another remarkable document is an address in reply to a 
demand for emancipation. 

REPLY TO A CHICAGO COMMITTEE ASKING 
FOR EMANCIPATION 

[September 13, 1862] 

The subject presented in the memorial is one upon 
which I have thought much for weeks past, and I may 
even say for months. I am approached with the most 
opposite opinions and advice, and that by religious men 
who are equally certain that they represent the Divine 
Will. I am sure that either the one or the other class 
is mistaken in that belief, and perhaps in some respects 
both. I hope it will not be irreverent for me to say that 
if it is probable that God would reveal His will to others 
on a point so connected with my duty, it might be sup- 
posed He would reveal it directly to me; for, unless I 
am more deceived in myself than I often am, it is my 
earnest desire to know the will of Providence in this 
matter. And if I can learn what it is, I will do it. 
These are not, however, the days of miracles, and I 
suppose it will be granted that I am not to expect a 
direct revelation. I must study the plain physical facts 
of the case, ascertain what is possible, and learn what 
appears to be wise and right. 

The subject is difficult, and good men do not agree. 
For instance, the other day four gentlemen of standing 
and intelligence from New York called as a delegation 
on business connected with the war; but, before leaving, 
two of them earnestly beset me to proclaim general 
emancipation, upon which the other two at once attacked 
them. You know also that the last session of Congress 
had a decided majority of anti-slavery men, yet they 
could not unite on this policy. And the same is true 
of the religious people. Why, the rebel soldiers are 
praying with a great deal more earnestness, I fear, than 



330 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

our own troops, and expecting God to favor their side; 
for one of our soldiers who had been taken prisoner told 
Senator Wilson a few days since that he met with noth- 
ing so discouraging as the evident sincerity of those he 
was among in their prayers. But we will talk over the 
merits of the case. 

What good would a proclamation of emancipation 
from me do, especially as we are now situated? I do 
not want to issue a document that the whole world will 
see must necessarily be inoperative, like the Pope's bull 
against the comet.* Would my word free the slaves, 
when I cannot even enforce the Constitution in the rebel 
states? Is there a single court, or magistrate, or indi- 
vidual that would be influenced by it there? And what 
reason is there to think it would have any greater effect 
upon the slaves than the late law of Congress, which I 
approved, and which offers protection and freedom to 
the slaves of rebel masters who come within our lines? 
Yet I cannot learn that that law has caused a single 
slave to come over to us. And suppose they could be 
induced by a proclamation of freedom from me to throw 
themselves upon us, what should we do with them? 
How can we feed and care for such a multitude? Gen- 
eral Butler wrote me a few days since that he was issuing 
more rations to the slaves who have rushed to him than 
to all the white troops under his command. They eat, 
and that is all; though it is true General Butler is feed- 
ing the whites also by the thousand, for it nearly amounts 

* In 1456 the Turks had taken Constantinople anrl established 
themselves in Europe. A comet appeared. According to a con- 
temporary historian Pope Calixtus III "decreed several days of 
prayer for the averting- of the wrath of God, that whatever 
calamity impended might he turned from the Christians and 
against the Turks." At the same time the plea. "From the Turk 
and the comet, good T^ord, deliver us." was added to the litany. 
This intercession of the Pope was unavailing, as the Turks still 
hold Constantinople, and the comet, known to the modern world 
as Halley's, still appears at intervals. A tradition arose that 
Calixtus had is.sued a bull (edict) excommunicating the comet, 
but no such bull is to be found among those published. See 
Andrew D. White, The Theories of the Comet. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 33I 

to a famine there. If, now, the pressure of the war 
should call off our forces from New Orleans to defend 
some other point, what is to prevent the masters from 
reducing the blacks to slavery again? For I am told 
that whenever the rebels take any black prisoners, free 
or slave, they immediately auction them off. They did 
so with those they took from a boat that was aground 
in the Tennessee River a few days ago. And then I 
am very ungenerously attacked for it ! For instance, when 
after the late battles at and near Bull Rim, an expedi- 
tion went out from Washington under a flag of truce 
to bury the dead and bring in the wounded, and the 
rebels seized the blacks who went along to help, and 
sent them into slavery, Horace Greeley said in his paper 
that the government would probably do nothing about 
it. What could I do? 

Now, then, tell me if you please, what possible result 
of good would follow the issuing of such a proclamation 
as you desire? Understand, I raise no objections against 
it on legal or constitutional grounds ; for, as commander- 
in-chief of the army and navy, in time of war I suppose 
I have a right to take any measure which may best sub- 
due the enemy; nor do I urge objections of a moral 
nature, in view of possible consequences of insurrection 
and massacre at the South. I view this matter as a 
practical war measure, to be decided on according to the 
advantages or disadvantages it may offer to the sup- 
pression of the rebellion. 

I admit that slavery is the root of the rebellion, or at 
least its sine qua non.^ The ambition of politicians may 
have instigated them to act, but they would have been 
impotent without slavery as their instrument. I will 
also concede that emancipation would help us in Europe, 
and convince them that we are incited by something 

* Literally, "without which not ; in other words, something 
absolutely necessary, or an indispensable condition. 



332 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

more than ambition. I grant, further, that it would help 
somewhat at the North, though not so much, I fear, as 
you and those you represent imagine. Still, some addi- 
tional strength would be added in that way to the war; 
and then, unquestionably, it would weaken the rebels 
by drawing off their laborers, which is of great im- 
portance; but I am not so sure we could do much with 
the blacks. If we M-ere to arm them, I fear that in a 
few weeks the arms would be in the hands of the rebels ; 
and, indeed, thus far we have not had arms enough to 
equip our white troops. I will mention another thing, 
though it meet only your scorn and contempt. There 
are fifty thousand bayonets in the Union armies from 
the border slave states. It would be a serious matter 
if, in consequence of a proclamation such as you desire, 
they should go over to the rebels. I do not think they 
all would — not so many, indeed, as a year ago, or as 
six months ago — not so many today as yesterday. Every 
day increases their Union feeling. They are also getting 
their pride enlisted, and want to beat the rebels. Let 
me say one thing more: I think you should admit that 
we already have an important principle to rally and 
unite the people, in the fact that constitutional govern- 
ment is at stake. This is a fundamental idea going 
down about as deep as anything. 

Do not misunderstand me because I have mentioned 
these objections. They indicate the difficulties that have 
thus far prevented my action in some such way as you 
desire. I have not decided against a proclamation of 
liberty to the slaves, but hold the matter under advise- 
ment; and I can assure you that the subject is on my 
mind, by day and night, more than any other. What- 
ever shall appear to be God's will, I will do. I trust 
that in the freedom with which I have canvassed your 
views I have not in any respect injured your feelings. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 333 

After the battle of Antietam, the preliminary emancipa- 
tion proclamation * was issued. It was done with the utmost 
hesitation, for Lincoln was doubtful of its expediency. A 
day or so later, in speaking of it, he said, "I can only trust 
in God that I have made no mistake." Its reception was not 
such as to encourage Lincoln, nor did the military situation 
help him. His bitter disappointment at McClellan's failure to 
crush Lee after Antietam is reflected in this message: 

TO GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLEDLAN 

[Telegram] 

War Department, 

Washington City, October 24, 1862 
Major-General McClellan: 

I have just read your dispatch about sore-tongued and 
fatigued horses. Will you pardon me for asking what 
the horses of jonr army have done since the battle of 
Antietam that fatigues anything? 

A. Lincoln 

In the meantime stocks fell, recruiting grew more difficult, 
and when the autumn elections came, New York, New Jersey, 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois all went Democratic 
in state and congressional elections. On November 8, General 
Carl Schurz, a native of Germany and a resident of Wisconsin, 
whom Lincoln had appointed, first, Minister to Spain, and 
later, a brigadier general, wrote Lincoln a most interesting 
letter. Always candid in the expression of his opinions, and 
ready to give advice, he wrote stating that the Republican defeat 
was not due to the emancipation proclamation, nor to the finan- 
cial policy of the government, nor to a desire for peace at any 
price. It was due, he argued, to the admission of political 
opponents of the administration into its councils, and the 
placing of its political enemies in control of the army. He 
demanded energy and success. His letter was hasty, preju- 

* By this preliminary proclamation of September 22, 1862, 
Lincoln announced that he would on January 1, 1S63, declare the 
slaves free in all the parts of the Southern states then in the 
hands of the Confederates, unless the states had by that time 
returned to their allegiance to the United States. 



334 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

diced, and opinionated. Lincoln replied with great restraint, 
but evidently in much haste. 



TO GENERAL CARL SCHURZ 

[Private and Confidential] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, November 10, 1862 
Gen. Schurz. 

My dear Sir: Yours of the 8th vras, today, read to 
me by Mrs. Schurz. We have lost the elections; and it 
is natural that each of us will believe, and say, it has 
been because his peculiar views was not made suffi- 
ciently prominent. I think I know what it was, but I 
may be mistaken. Three main causes told the whole 
story. 1. The Democrats were left in a majority by 
our friends going to the war. 2. The Democrats observed 
this and determined to reinstate themselves in power, 
and 3. Our newspapers, by vilifying and disparaging 
the administration, furnished them all the weapons to 
do it with. Certainly the ill-success of the war had 
much to do with this. 

You give a different set of reasons. If you had not 
made the following statements, I should not have sus- 
pected them to be true. "The defeat of the administra- 
tion is the administration's own fault.*' (Opinion.) "It 
admitted its professed opponents to its counsels." (As- 
serted as a fact.) "It placed the Army, now a great 
power in this Republic, into the hands of its enemies." 
(Asserted as a fact.) "In all personal questions to be 
hostile to the party of the government, seemed to be a 
title to consideration." (Asserted as a fact.) "If to 
forget the great rule, that if you are true to your friends, 
your friends will be true to you, and that you make your 
enemies stronger by placing them upon an equality with 
your friends." "Is it surprising that the opponents of 
the administration should have got into their hands the 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 335 

government of the principal states, after they have had 
for a long time the principal management of the vt^ar, 
the great business of the national government?" 

I cannot dispute about the matter of opinion. On 
the three matters (stated as facts) I shall be glad to 
have your evidence upon them when I shall meet you. 
The plain facts, as they appear to me, are these. The 
administration came into power, very largely in a 
minority of the popular vote. Notwithstanding this, it 
distributed to its party friends as nearly all the civil 
patronage as any administration ever did. The war 
came. The administration could not even start in this, 
without assistance outside of its party. It was mere 
nonsense to suppose a minority could put down a 
majority in rebellion. Mr. Schurz (now Gen. Schurz) 
was about here then, and I do not recollect that he 
then considered all who were not Republicans were 
enemies of the government, and that none of them must 
be appointed to military positions. He will correct me 
if I am mistaken. It so happened that very few of our 
friends had a military education or were of the pro- 
fession of arms. It would have been a question whether 
the war should be conducted on military knowledge, or 
on political affinity, only that our own friends (I think 
Mr. Schurz included) seemed to think that such a ques- 
tion was inadmissible. Accordingly I have scarcely 
appointed a Democrat to a command who was not urged 
by many Republicans and opposed by none. It was so 
as to McClellan. He was first brought forward by the 
Republican governor of Ohio, and claimed and con- 
tended for at the same time by the Republican governor 
of Pennsylvania. I received recommendations from 
the Republican delegations in Congress, and I believe 
every one of them recommended a majority of Demo- 
crats. But, after all many Republicans were appointed ; 
and I mean no disparagement to them when I say I do 
not see that their superiority of success has been so 



336 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

marked as to throw great suspicion on the good faith 
of those who are not Republicans. 
Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

A military order of this period gives an excellent example of 
the deep reverence of attitude which is not always attributed 
to Lincoln. 



ORDER FOR SABBATH OBSERVANCE 

[November 15, 1862] 

The President, commander-in-chief of the army and 
navy, desires and enjoins the orderly observance of the 
Sabbath by the officers and men in the military and 
naval service. The importance for man and beast of 
the prescribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of Christian 
soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the best 
sentiment of a Christian people, and a due regard for 
the Divine Will, demand that Sunday labor in the army 
and navy be reduced to the measure of strict necessity. 
The discipline and character of the national forces 
should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be imperiled, 
by the profanation of the day or name of the Most 
High. "At this time of public distress" — adopting the 
words of Washington in 1776 — "men may find enough 
to do in the service of God and their country without 
abandoning themselves to vice and immorality." The 
first general order issued by the Father of his Country 
after the Declaration of Independence indicates the 
spirit in which our institutions were founded and should 
ever be defended. "The General hopes and trusts that 
every officer and man will endeavor to live and act as 
becomes a Christian soldier, defending the dearest rights 
and .liberties of his country." 

Abraham Lincoln 
Official: E. D. Townsend, Assistant Adjutant General 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 337 

In November General N. P. Banks was placed in command 
of an expedition to go to New Orleans by sea. He was dila- 
tory, and Lincoln wrote him this characteristic letter: 

TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, November 22, 1862 
My dear General Banks: Early last week you left 
me in high hope with j^our assurance that you would be 
off with your expedition at the end of that week, or 
early in this. It is now the end of this, and I have just 
been overwhelmed and confounded with the sight of a 
requisition made by you which, I am assured, cannot be 
filled and got off within an hour short of two months. 
I inclose you a copy of the requisition, in some hope that 
it is not genuine — that you have never seen it. My 
dear General, this expanding and piling up of im- 
pedimenta has been, so far, almost our ruin, and will 
be our final ruin if it is not abandoned. If you had the 
articles of this requisition upon the wharf, with the neces- 
sary animals to make them of any use, and forage for the 
animals, you could not get vessels together in two weeks 
to carry the whole, to say nothing of your twenty thou- 
sand men; and, having the vessels, you could not put 
the cargoes aboard in two weeks more. And, after all, 
where you are going you have no use for them. When 
you parted with me you had no such idea in your mind. 
I know you had not, or you could not have expected to 
be off so soon as you said. You must get back to some- 
thing like the plan you had then, or your expedition is 
a failure before you start. You must be off before 
Congress meets. You would be better off anywhere, 
and especially where you are going, for not having a 
thousand wagons doing nothing but hauling forage to 
feed the animals that draw them, and taking at least 
two thousand men to care for the wagons and animals, 
who otherwise might be two thousand good soldiers. 



338 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Now, dear General, do not think this is an ill-natured 
letter ; it is the very reverse. The simple publication of 
this requisition would ruin you. 

Very truly your friend, 

A. Lincoln 

Carl Schurz was not convinced or silenced by Lincoln's 
reply to his first letter, and on November 20 he replied with 
another, in which he reiterated his former arguments. Lin- 
coln's reply is remarkably terse and effective. 

TO GENERAL CARL SCHURZ 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, November 24, 1862 
General Carl Schurz. 

My dear Sir: I have just received and read your 
letter of the 20th. The purport of it is that we lost 
the late elections and the administration is failing be- 
cause the war is unsuccessful, and that I must not flatter 
myself that I am not justly to blame for it. I certainly 
know that if the war fails, the administration fails, and 
that I will be blamed for it, whether I deserve it or not. 
And I ought to be blamed if I could do better. You 
think I could do better ; therefore you blame me already. 
I think I could not do better; therefore I blame you for 
blaming me. I understand you now to be willing to 
accept the help of men who are not Republicans, pro- 
vided they have "heart in it." Agreed. I want no others. 
But who is to be the judge of hearts, or of "heart in 
it"? If I must discard my own judgment and take 
j^ours, I must also take that of others; and by the time 
I should reject all I should be advised to reject, I should 
have none left. Republicans or others — not even yourself. 
For be assured, my dear sir, there are men who have 
"heart in it" that think you are performing your part 
as poorly as you think I am performing mine. I cer- 
tainly have been dissatisfied with the slowness of Buell 
and McClellan; but before I relieved them I had great 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 339 

fears I should not find successors to them who would 
do better ; and I am sorry to add that I have seen little 
since to relieve those fears. 

I do not clearly see the prospect of any more rapid 
movements. I fear we shall at last find out that the diffi- 
culty is in our case rather than in particular generals. I 
wish to disparage no one — certainly not those who sympa- 
thize with me; but I must say I need success more than I 
need sympathy^ and that I have not seen the so much 
greater evidence of getting success from my sympathizers 
than from those who are denounced as the contrary. It 
does seem to me that in the field the two classes have 
been very much alike in what they have done and what 
they have failed to do. In sealing their faith with their 
blood, Baker and Lyon and Bohlen and Richardson, 
Republicans, did all that men could do; but did they any 
more than Kearny and Stevens and Reno and Mansfield, 
none of whom were Republicans, and some at least of 
whom have been bitterly and repeatedly denounced to 
me as secession sympathizers? I will not perform the 
ungrateful task of comparing cases of failure. 

In answer to your question, "Has it not been publicly 
stated in the newspapers, and apparently proved as a 
fact, that from the commencement of the war the enemy 
was continually supplied with information by some of 
the confidential subordinates of as important an officer 
as Adjutant-General Thomas?" I must say "No," as 
far as my knowledge extends. And I add that if you 
can give any tangible evidence upon the subject, I will 
thank you to come to this citv and do so. 
Very truly your friend, 

A. Lincoln 

In hi<; annual me<:sag:e to Congress of 1862, Lincoln again 
brouglit up the question of compensated emancipation in an 
even more advanced form, and again urged the colonization of 
the freedmen. The message is notable for the beauty and 
elevation of its concluding paragraph. 



340 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

EXTRACT FROM ANNUAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS 

[December 1, 1862] 

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of 
Representatives: Since your last annual assembling, 
another year of health and bountiful harvests has passed ; 
and while it has not pleased the Almighty to bless us 
with a return of peace, we can but press on, guided by 
the best light He gives us, trusting that in His own 
good time and wise way, all will yet be well. 

The correspondence, touching foreign affairs, which 
has taken place during the last year, is herewith sub- 
mitted, in virtual compliance with a request to that 
effect made by the House of Representatives near the 
close of the last session of Congress. 

If the condition of our relations with other nations is 
less gratifying than it has usually been at former 
periods, it is certainly more satisfactory than a nation 
so unhappily distracted as we are, might reasonably have 
apprehended. In the month of June last, there were 
some grounds to expect that the maritime powers, which, 
at the beginning of our domestic difficulties, so unwisely 
and unnecessarily, as we think, recognized the insurgents 
as a belligerent, would soon recede from that position, 
which has proved only less injurious to themselves than 
to our own country. But the temporary reverses which 
afterward befell the national arms, and which were ex- 
aggerated by our own disloyal citizens abroad, have 
hitherto delayed that act of simple justice. 

On the 22d day of September last a proclamation was 
issued by the Executive, a copy of which is herewith 
submitted. In accordance with the purpose expressed 
in the second paragraph of that paper, I now respect- 
fully recall your attention to what may be called "com- 
pensated emancipation." 

A nation may be said to consist of its territory, its 
people, and its laws. The territory is the only part 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 341 

ivMeh is of certain durability. "One generation passeth 
away, and another generation cometh, but the earth 
abideth forever." * It is of the first importance to duly 
consider and estimate this ever-enduring part. That 
portion of the earth's surface which is owned and in- 
habited by the people of the United States is well 
adapted to be the home of one national family, and it 
is not well adapted for two or more. Its vast extent and 
its variety of climate and productions are of advantage 
in this age for one people, whatever they might have 
been in former ages. Steam, telegraphs, and intelligence 
have brought these to be an advantageous combination 
for one united people. 

In the Inaugural Address I briefly pointed out the 
total inadequacy of disunion as a remedy for the differ- 
ences between the people of the two sections. I did so 
in language which I cannot improve and which, there- 
fore, I beg to repeat: 

"One section of our country believes slavery is right 
and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is 
wrong and ought not to be extended. This is the only 
substantial dispute. The fugitive-slave cause of the 
Constitution and the law for the suppression of the 
foreign slave-trade are each as well enforced, perhaps, 
a.s any law can ever be in a community where the moral 
sense of the people imperfectly supports the law itself. 
The great body of the people abide by the dry legal 
obligation in both cases, and a few break over in each. 
This, I think, cannot be perfectly cured ; and it would 
be worse in both cases after the separation of the sec- 
tions than before. The foreign slave-trade, now imper- 
fectly suppressed, would be ultimately revived without 
restriction in one section ; while fugitive slaves, now only 
partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at all 
by the other. 

"Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot 
remove our respective sections from each other, nor build 

* r]colesiastes, i, 4. 



34J^ SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

an impassable wall between them. A liTisband and wife 
may be divorced and go out of the presence and beyond 
the reach of each other; but the different parts of our 
country cannot do this. They cannot but remain face 
to face ; and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must 
continue between them. Is it possible, then, to make 
that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory 
after separation than before? Can aliens make treaties 
easier than friends can make laws? Can treaties be 
more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can 
among friends ? Suppose you go to war, you cannot 
fight always; and when, after much loss on both sides 
and no gain on either^ you cease fighting, the identical 
old questions as to terms of intercourse are again upon 
you." 

There is no line, straight or crooked, suitable for a 
national boundary ujDon which to divide. Trace through, 
from east to west, upon the line between the free and 
slave country, and we shall find a little more than one- 
third of its leng^th are rivers, easy to be crossed, and 
populated, or soon to be populated, thickly upon both 
sides; while nearly all its remaining length are merely 
surveyors' lines, over which people may walk back and 
forth without any consciousness of their presence. No 
part of this line can be made any more difficult to pass, 
by writing it down on paper or parchment as a national 
boundary. The fact of separation, if it comes, gives 
up, on the part of the seceding section, the fugitive-slave 
clause, along with all other constitutional obligations 
upon the section seceded from, while I should expect no 
treaty stipulation would be ever made to take its place. 

But there is another difficulty. The great interior 
region bounded east by the Alleghenies, north by the 
British dominions, west by the Rocky Mountains, and 
south by the line along which the culture of corn and 
cotton meets, and which includes part of Virginia, part 
of Tennessee, all of Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, 



j 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 343 

Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, 
and the Territories of Dakota, Nebraska, and part of 
Colorado, already has above ten millions of people, 
and will have fifty millions within fifty years, if not 
prevented Dy any political folly or mistake. It con- 
tains more than one-third of the country owned by the 
United States — certainly more than one million of 
square miles. Once half as populous as Massachusetts 
already is, it would have more than seventy-five millions 
of people. A glance at the map shows that, territorially 
speaking, it is the great body of the republic. The other 
parts are but marginal borders to it, the magnificent 
region sloping west from the Rocky Mountains to the 
Pacific being the deepest, and also the richest, in un- 
developed resources. In the production of provisions, 
grains, grasses, and all which proceed from them, this 
great interior region is naturally one of the most im- 
portant in the world. Ascertain from the statistics the 
small proportion of the region which has, as yet, been 
brought into cultivation, and also the large and rapidly 
increasing amount of its products, and we shall be over- 
whelmed with the magnitude of the prospect presented. 
And yet this region has no seacoast, touches no ocean 
anywhere. As part of one nation, its people now find, 
and may forever find, their way to Europe by New York, 
to South America and Africa by New Orleans, and to 
Asia by San Francisco. But separate our common 
country into two nations, as designed by the present 
rebellion, and every man of this great interior region 
is thereby cut off from some one or more of the out- 
lets — not perhaps by a physical barrier, but by em- 
barrassing and onerous trade regulations. 

And this is true, wherever a dividing or boundary 
line may be fixed. Place it between the now free and 
slave country, or place it south of Kentucky, or north 
of Ohio, and still the truth remains that none south of 
it can trade to any port or place north of it, except upon 
terms dictated by a government foreign to them. These 



344 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

outlets, east, west, and south, are indispensable to the 
well-being of the people inhabiting, and to inhabit, this 
vast interior region. Which of the three may be the 
best, is no proper question. All are better than either; 
and all of right belong to that people and their suc- 
cessors forever. True to themselves, they will not ask 
where a line of separation shall be, but will vow rather 
that there shall be no such line. Nor are the marginal 
regions less interested in these communications to and 
through them to the great outside world. They too, and 
each of them, must have access to this Egypt ^ of the 
west, without paying toll at the crossing of any national 
boundary. 

Our national strife springs not from our permanent 
part, not from the land we inhabit, not from our national 
homestead. There is no possible severing of this but 
would multiply and not mitigate evils among us. In all 
its adaptations and aptitudes it demands union and 
abhors separation. In fact it would ere long force re- 
union, however much of blood and treasure the separa- 
tion might have cost. 

Our strife pertains, to ourselves — to the passing gen- 
erations of men; and it cannot without convulsion be 
hushed forever with the passing of one generation. 

In this view I recommend the adoption of the fol- 
lowing resolution and articles amendatory to the Consti- 
tution of the United States: 

"Resolved by the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives of the United States of America in Congress 
assembled (two-thirds of both houses concurring), That 
the following articles be proposed to the legislatures 
(or conventions) of the several states as amendments 
to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of 
which articles when ratified by three-fourths of the said 

• Eg-ypt was the granary of the ancient eastern world. 
Lincoln is of course referring' to the great grain-producing West. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 345 

legislatures (or conventions) to be valid as part or parts 
of the said Constitution^, viz.: 

"Article — 

"Every state wherein slavery now exists which shall 
abolish the same therein at any time or times before the 
first day of January in the year of our Lord one thou- 
sand and nine hundred, shall receive compensation from 
the United States as follows, to wit: 

"The President of the United States shall deliver to 
every such state bonds of the United States, bearing 
interest at the rate of — per cent per annum, to an 

amount equal to the aggregate sum of , for each 

slave shown to have been therein by the eighth census 
of the United States, said bonds to be delivered to such 
state by installments, or in one parcel at the completion 
of the abolishment, according as the same shall have 
been gradual or at one time within such state; and 
interest shall begin to run upon any such bond only 
from the proper time of its delivery as aforesaid. Any 
state having received bonds as aforesaid, and afterward 
reintroducing or tolerating slavery therein, shall refund 
to the United States the bonds so received, or the value 
thereof, and all interest paid thereon. 

"Article — 
"All slaves who shall have enjoyed actual freedom 
by the chances of the war at any time before the end 
of the rebellion, shall be forever free; but all owners 
of such who shall not have been disloyal shall be com- 
pensated for them at the same rates as are provided 
for states adopting abolishment of slavery, but in such 
way that no slave shall be twice accounted for. 

"Article — 
"Congress may appropriate money and otherwise pro- 
vide for colonizing free colored persons, with their own 
consent, at any place or places without the United 
States." 



346 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

I beg indulgence to discuss these proposed articles at 
some length. Without slavery the rebellion could never 
have existed; without slavery it could not continue. 

Among the friends of the Union there is great diver- 
sity of sentiment and of policy in regard to slavery and 
the African race amongst us. Some vrould perpetuate 
slavery; some would abolish it suddenly, and without 
compensation; some would abolish it gradually and with 
compensation; some would remove the freed people from 
us, and some would retain them with us; and there are 
yet other minor diversities. Because of these diversities 
we waste much strength in struggles among ourselves. 
By mutual concession we should harmonize and act to- 
gether. This would be compromise; but it would be 
compromise among the friends, and not with the enemies, 
of the Union. These articles are intended to embody a 
plan of such mutual concessions. If the plan shall be 
adopted, it is assumed that emancipation will follow at 
least in several of the states. 

As to the first article, the main points are: firsts the 
emancipation ; secondly, the length of time for consum- 
mating it — thirty-seven years; and, thirdly, the com- 
pensation. 

The emancipation will be unsatisfactory to the advo- 
cates of perpetual slavery; but the length of time should 
greatly mitigate their dissatisfaction. The time spares 
both races from the evils of sudden derangement — in 
fact, from the necessity of any derangement; while most 
of those whose habitual course of thought will be dis- 
turbed by the measure will have passed away before 
its consummation. They will never see it. Another 
class will hail the prospect of emancipation, but will 
deprecate the length of time. They will feel that it 
gives too little to the now living slaves. But it really 
gives them much. It saves them from the vagrant desti- 
tution which must largely attend immediate emanci- 
pation in localities where their numbers are very great; 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 347 

and it gives the inspiring assurance that their posterity 
shall be free forever. The plan leaves to each state 
choosing to act under it to abolish slavery now, or at 
the end of the century, or at any intermediate time, or 
by degrees extending over the whole or any part of the 
period ; and it obliges no two states to proceed alike. It 
also provides for compensation, and generally the mode 
of making it. This, it would seem, must further mitigate 
the dissatisfaction of those who favor perpetual slavery, 
and especially of those who are to receive the compen- 
sation. Doubtless some of those who are to pay, and 
not to receive, will object. Yet the measure is both just 
and economical. In a certain sense the liberation of 
slaves is the destruction of property — property acquired 
by descent or by purchase, the same as any other property. 
It is no less true for having been often said, that the 
people of the South are not more responsible for the 
original introduction of this property than are the people 
of the North; and when it is remembered how unhesi- 
tatingly we all use cotton and sugar and share the profits 
of dealing in them, it may not be quite safe to say that 
the South has been more responsible than the North for 
its continuance. If, then, for a common object this 
property is to be sacrificed, is it not just that it be done 
at a common charge? 

And if, with less money, or money more easily paid, 
we can preserve the benefits of the Union by this means 
than we can by the war alone, is it not also economical 
to do it? Let us consider it, then. Let us ascertain the 
sum we have expended in the war since compensated 
emancipation was proposed last March, and consider 
whether, if that measure had been promptly accepted 
by even some of the slave states, the same sum would 
not have done more to close the war than has been other- 
wise done. If so, the measure would save money, and 
in that view would be a prudent and economical measure. 
Certainly it is not so easy to pay something as it is to 



348 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

pay nothing; but it is easier to pay a large sum than 
it is to pay a larger one. And it is easier to pay any 
sum when we are able, than it is to pay it before we are 
able. The war requires large sums, and requires them 
at once. The aggregate sum necessary for compensated 
emancipation of course would be large. But it would 
require no ready cash, nor the bonds even, any faster 
than the emancipation progresses. This might not, and 
probably would not, close before the end of the thirty- 
seven years. At that time we shall probably have 
100,000,000 of the people to share the burden, instead of 
31,000,000 as now. And not only so, but the increase 
of our population ma}^ be expected to continue for a 
long time after that period, as rapidly as before, because 
our territory will not have become full. I do not state 
this inconsiderately. At the same ratio of increase which 
we have maintained, on an average, from our first na- 
tional census in 1790 until that of 1860, we should in 
1900 have a population of 103,208,415. And why may 
we not continue that ratio far beyond that period? Our 
abundant room — our broad national homestead — is our 
ample resource. Were our territory as limited as are 
the British Isles, very certainly our population could 
not expand as stated. Instead of receiving the foreign- 
born as now, we should be compelled to send part of the 
native-born away. But such is not our condition. We 
have 2,963,000 square miles. Europe has 3,800,000, 
with a population averaging 73^ persons to the square 
mile. Why may not our country, at the same time, aver- 
age as many? Is it less fertile? Has it more waste 
surface, by mountains, rivers, lakes, deserts, or other 
causes? Is it inferior to Europe in any natural advan- 
tage? If, then, we are at some time to be as populous 
as Europe, how soon? As to when this may be, we can 
judge by the past and the present; as to when it will be, 
if ever, depends much on whether we maintain the Union. 
Several of our states are already above the average of 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 349 

Europe — 73^^ to the square mile. Massachusetts has 
157; Rhode Island, 133; Connecticut, 99; New York 
and New Jersey, each 80. Also two other great states, 
Pennsylvania and Ohio, are not far below, the former 
having 63 and the latter 59. The states already above 
the European average, except New York, have increased 
in as rapid a ratio since passing that point as ever 
before, while no one of them is equal to some other parts 
of our country in natural capacity for sustaining a dense 
population. 

Taking the nation in the aggregate, we find its popu- 
lation and ratio of increase for the several decennial 
periods to be as follows: 

1790 3,929,827 

1800 5,305,937 35.02 per cent ratio of increase 

1810 7,239,814 36.45 

1820 9,638,131 33.13 

1830 12,866,020 33.49 

1840 17,069,453 32.67 

1850 23,191,876 35.87 

1860 31,443,790 35.58 

This shows an average decennial increase of 34.60 
per cent in population through the seventy years from 
our first to our last census yet taken. It is seen that 
the ratio of increase at no one of these seven periods 
is either two per cent below or two per cent above the 
average, thus showing how inflexible, and consequently 
how reliable, the law of increase in our case is. Assum- 
ing that it will continue, gives the following results: 

1870 42,323,341 

1880 56,967,216 

1890 76,677,872 

1900 103,208,415 

1910 138,918,526 

1920 186,984,335 



350 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

These figures show that our country may be as populous 
as Europe now is at some point between 1920 and 1930 
— say about 1925 — our territory, at 73^ persons to the 
square mile, being of capacity to contain 217,186,000.* 

And we will reach this, too, if we do not ourselves 
relinquish the chance by the folly and evils of disunion, 
or by long and exhausting war springing from the only 
great element of national discord among us. While it 
cannot be foreseen exactly how much one huge example 
of secession, breeding lesser ones indefinitely, would 
retard population, civilization, and prosperity, no one 
can doubt that the extent of it would be very great and 
injurious. 

The proposed emancipation would shorten the war, 
perpetuate peace, insure this increase of population, and 
proportionately the wealth of the country. With these, 
we should pay all the emancipation would cost, together 
with our other debt, easier than we should pay our other 
debt without it. If we had allowed our old national 
debt to run at six per cent per annum, simple interest, 
from the end of our Revolutionary struggle until today, 
without paying anything on either principle or interest, 
each man of us would owe less upon that debt now than 
each man owed upon it then; and this because our in- 
crease of men, through the whole period, has been 
greater than six per cent — has run faster than the in- 
terest upon the debt. Thus, time alone relieves a debtor 
nation, so long as its population increases faster than 
unpaid interest accumulates on its debt. 

This fact would be no excuse for delaying payment of 
what is justly due; but it shows the great importance of 
time in this connection — the great advantage of a policy 
by which we shall not have to pay, until we number a 

* Lincoln again overestimated the future growth of population 
in the United States. The actual figures have been : 

1870 38,818,449 1900 76,303,387 

1880 50.155.783 1910 91.972.2 6fi 

1890 63,069,756 1920 105,083,108 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 351 

hundred millions, what by a different policy we would 
have to pay now, when we number but thirty-one mil- 
lions. In a word, it shows that a dollar will be much 
harder to pay for the war than will be a dollar for 
emancipation on the proposed plan. And then the latter 
will cost no blood, no precious life. It will be a saving 
of both. 

As to the second article, I think it would be imprac- 
ticable to return to bondage the class of persons therein 
contemplated. Some of them doubtless, in the property 
sense, belong to loyal owners ; and hence provision is 
made in this article for compensating such. 

The third article relates to the future of tlie freed 
people. It does not oblige, but merely authorizes, Con- 
gress to aid in colonizing such as may consent. This 
ought not to be regarded as objectionable, on the one 
hand or on the otlier, insomuch as it comes to nothing 
unless by the mutual consent of the people to be de- 
ported, and the American voters through their repre- 
sentatives in Congress. 

I cannot make it better known than it already is, that 
I strongly favor colonization. And yet I wish to say 
there is an objection urged against free colored persons 
remaining in the country which is largely imaginary, 
if not sometimes malicious. 

It is insisted that their presence would injure and 
displace white labor and white laborers. If there ever 
could be a proper time for mere catch arguments, that 
time surely is not now. In times like the present, men 
should utter nothing for which they would not willingly 
be responsible through time and in eternity. Is it true, 
then, that colored people can displace any more white 
labor by being free than by remaining slaves? If they 
stay in their old places, they jostle no white laborers; 
if they leave their old places, they leave them open to 
white laborers. Logically, there is neither more nor 
less of it. Emancipation, even without deportation, 



352 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

would probably enhance the wages of white labor, and 
very surely would not reduce them. Thus, the customary 
amount of labor would still have to be performed; the 
freed people would surely not do more than their old 
proportion of it, and very probably for a time would 
do less, leaving an increased part to white laborers, 
bringing their labor into greater demand, and conse- 
quently enhancing the wages of it. With deportation, 
even to a limited extent, enhanced wages to white labor 
is mathematically certain. Labor is like any other com- 
modity in the market — increase the demand for it, and 
you increase the price of it. Reduce the supply of black 
labor by colonizing the black laborer out of the country, 
and by precisely so much you increase the demand for, 
and wages of, white labor. 

But it is dreaded that the freed people will swarm 
forth and cover the whole land.^ Are they not already 
in the land.'^ Will liberation make them any more 
numerous? Equally distributed among the whites of 
the whole country, and there would be but one colored 
to seven whites. Could the one in any way greatly 
disturb the seven? There are many communities now 
having more than one free colored person to seven 
whites, and this without any apparent consciousness of 
evil from it. The District of Columbia, and the states 
of Maryland and Delaware, are all in this condition. 
The District has more than one free colored to six 
whites; and yet in its frequent petitions to Congress I 
believe it has never presented the presence of free 
colored persons as one of its grievances. But why should 
emancipation South send the free people North? People 
of any color seldom run unless there be something to run 
from. Heretofore colored people, to some extent, have 
fled North from bondage; and now, perhaps, from both 
bondage and destitution. But if gradual emancipation 
and deportation be adopted, they will have neither to 
flee from. Their old masters will give them wages at 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 353 

least until new laborers can be procured ; and the f reed- 
men, in turn, will gladly give their labor for the wages 
till new homes can be found for them in congenial climes 
and with people of their own blood and race. This 
proposition can be trusted on the mutual interests in- 
volved. And, in any event, cannot the North decide for 
itself whether to receive them ? 

Again, as practice proves more than theory, in any 
case, has there been any irruption of colored people 
northward because of the abolishment of slavery in this 
District last spring.^ 

What I have said of the proportion of free colored 
persons to the whites in the District is from the census 
of 1860, having no reference to persons called contra- 
bands, nor to those made free by the acts of Congress 
abolishing slavery there. 

The plan consisting of these articles is recommended, 
not but that a restoration of the national authority would 
be accepted without its adoption. 

Nor will the war, nor proceedings under the proclama- 
tion of September 22, 1862, be stayed because of the 
recommendation of this plan. Its timely adoption, I 
doubt not, would bring restoration, and thereby stay 
both. 

And, notwithstanding this plan, the recommendation 
that Congress provide by law for compensating any state 
which may adopt emancipation before this plan shall 
have been acted upon, is hereby earnestly renewed. Such 
would be only an advance part of the plan, and the same 
arguments apply to both. 

This plan is recommended as a means, not in exclusion 
of, but additional to, all others for restoring and pre- 
serving the national authority throughout the Union. 
The subject is presented exclusivelv in its economical 
aspect. The plan would, I am confident, secure peace 
more speedily, and maintain it more permanently, than 
can be done by force alone ; while all it would cost, con- 



354 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

sidering amounts^ and manner of payment, and times of 
payment, would be easier paid than will be the addi- 
tional cost of the war if we rely solely upon force. It 
is much — very much — that it would cost no blood at all. 

The plan is proposed as permanent constitutional law. 
It cannot become such without the concurrence of, first, 
two-thirds of Congress and, afterward, three-fourths of 
the states. The requisite three-fourths of the states will 
necessarily include seven of the slave states. Their con- 
currence, if obtained, will give assurance of their sev- 
erally adopting emancipation at no very distant day 
upon the new constitutional terms. This assurance 
would end the struggle now, and save the Union forever. 

I do not forget the gravity which should characterize 
a paper addressed to the Congress of the nation by the 
Chief Magistrate of the nation. Nor do I forget that 
some of you are my seniors, nor that many of you have 
more experience than I in the conduct of public affairs. 
Yet I trust that in view of the great responsibility rest- 
ing upon me, you will perceive no want of respect to 
yourselves in any undue earnestness I may seem to 
display. 

Is it doubted, then, that the plan I propose, if adopted, 
would shorten the war, and thus lessen its expenditure 
of money and of blood .^^ Is it doubted that it w^ould 
restore the national authority and national prosperity, 
and perpetuate both indefinitely? Is it doubted that 
we here — ^Congress and Executive — can secure its 
adoption ? Will not the good people respond to a united 
and earnest appeal from us? Can we, can they, by any 
other means so certainly or so speedily assure these 
vital objects? We can succeed only by concert. It is 
not "Can any of us imagine better?" but, "Can we all 
do better?" Object whatsover is possible, still the ques- 
tion occurs, "Can we do better?" The dogmas of the 
quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 355 

occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise 
with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think 
anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and 
then we shall save our country. 

Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of 
this Congress and this administration will be remem- 
bered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance 
or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The 
fiery trial through which we pass will light us down, in 
honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we 
are for the Union. The world will not forget that we 
say this. We know how to save the Union. The world 
knows we do know how to save it. We — even we here — 
hold the power and bear the responsibility. In giving 
freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free — 
honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. 
We shall nobl}^ save or meanly lose the last, best hope 
of earth. Other means may succeed ; this could not fail. 
The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just — a way which, 
if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God 
must forever bless. 

Abraham Lincoln 

A group of radical leaders in the Senate in December, with 
the full knowledge of Secretary Chase, demanded the resigna- 
tion of Secretary Seward, whom Chase disliked and opposed. 
Seward at once placed his resignation in Lincoln's hands. 
Lincoln did not want to lose either officer, but he did not 
want to appear to lean to either side. He and his cabinet, 
Seward being absent, met the group of senators, and Chase 
was forced into a most uncomfortable and humiliating position. 
He offered to resign, holding the letter closely in his hands as 
he did so. To his surprise Lincoln held out his hand and took 
it. He exclaimed a few moments later to one of his secreta- 
ries, "I can ride now, for I have a pumpkin in each end of the 
sack." He then wrote the following letter, which he sent to 
both men: 



356 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

» 

TO WILLIAM H. SEWARD AND SALMON P. CHASE 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, December 20, 1862 
Hon. William H. Seward and Hon. Salmon P. Chase. 

Gentlemen : You have respectively tendered me 
your resignations as Secretary of State and Secretary 
of the Treasury of the United States. I am apprised 
of the circumstances which may render this course per- 
sonally desirable to each of you; but after most anxious 
consideration my deliberate judgment is that the public 
interest does not admit of it. I therefore have to request 
that you will resume the duties of your departments 
respectively. 

Your obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln 

On January 1, 1863, in spite of a widespread belief that he 
M'ould not do so, Lincoln issued the promised Emancipation 
Proclamation. 



EM A NCIPA TION P ROC LA MA TION 

[January 1, 1863] "" 

Whereas, on the twenty-second day of September, in 
the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President 
of the United States, containing, among other things, the 
following, to wit: 

"That on the first day of January, in the year of our 
Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all 
persons held as slaves within any state, or designated 
part of a state, the people whereof shall then be in 
rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thence- 
forward, and forever free; and the Executive Govern- 
ment of the United States, including the military and 
naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the 
freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 357 

repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts 
they may make for their actual freedom. 

''That the Executive will, on the first day of January 
aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the states and 
parts of states, if any, in which the people thereof 
respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United 
States ; and the fact that any state, or the people thereof, 
shall on that day be in good faith represented in the 
Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto 
at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters 
of such state shall have participated, shall in the absence 
of strong countervailing testimony be deemed conclusive 
evidence that such state and the people thereof are not 
then in rebellion against the United States." 

Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the 
United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as 
commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United 
States, in time of actual armed rebellion against the 
authority and government of the United States, and as 
a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said 
rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year 
of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, 
and in accordance with my purpose so to do, publicly 
proclaimed for the full period of 100 days from the day 
first above mentioned, order and designate as the states 
and parts of states wherein the people thereof, re- 
spectively, are this day in rebellion against the United 
States, the following, to wit: 

Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana (except the parishes of 
St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. 
Charles, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Terre 
Bonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, 
including the city of New Orleans), Mississipi, Alabama, 
Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and 
Virginia (except the forty-eight counties designated as 
West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkeley, 
Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess 



358 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and 
Portsmouth), and which excepted parts are for the 
present left precisely as if this proclamation were not 
issued. 

And by virtue of the power and for the purpose 
aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held 
as slaves within said designated states and parts of 
states are, and henceforward shall be, free; and that the 
Executive Government of the United States, including 
the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize 
and maintain the freedom of said persons. 

And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to 
be free to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary 
self-defense; and I recommend to them that, in all cases 
when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable 
wages. 

And I further declare and make known that such 
persons of suitable condition will be received into the 
armed service of the United States to garrison forts, 
positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels 
of all sorts in said service. 

And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of 
justice, warranted by the Constitution upon military 
necessity,* I invoke the considerate judgment of man- 
kind and the gracious favor of Almighty God, 

In witness, etc. Abraham Lincoln 

By the President: William H. Seward, Secretary of 
State. t 
The opposition to emancipation did not cease, as the fol- 
lowing letter to his Springfield friend, General McClernand, 
shows : 

* Upon military necessity. This phrase was suggested by 
Secretary Chase as making clear the authority upon which the 
proclamation rested. 

t As a military document this should have been countersigned 
by Secretary Stanton. Lincoln said Seward's signing it was 
the result of a compromise. It was probably done to satisfy 
those who contended that he had the right to issue the procla- 
mation as President as well as in the capacity of commander- 
in-chief. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 359 

TO GENERAL JOHN A. McCLEBNAND 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, January 8, 1863 
Major-General McClernand. 

My dear Sir: Your interesting communication by 
the hand of Major Scates is received. I never did ask 
more, nor ever was willing to accept less, than for all 
the states, and the people thereof, to take and hold 
their places and their rights in the Union, under the 
Constitution of the United States. For this alone have 
I felt authorized to struggle, and I seek neither more 
nor less now. Still, to use a coarse but an expressive 
figure, "broken eggs cannot be mended." I have issued 
the Emancipation Proclamation, and I cannot retract it. 
After the commencement of hostilities, I struggled 
nearly a year and a half to get along without touching 
the "institution" ; and when finally I conditionally de- 
termined to touch it, I gave a hundred days' fair notice 
of my purpose to all the states and people, within which 
time they could have turned it wholly aside by simply 
again becoming good citizens of the United States. 

They chose to disregard it, and I made the peremptory 
proclamation on what appeared to me to be a military 
necessity. And being made, it must stand. As to the 
states not included in it, of course they can have their 
rights in the Union as of old. Even the people of the 
states included, if they choose, need not to be hurt by it. 
Let them adopt systems of apprenticeship for the colored 
people, conforming substantially to the most approved 
plans of gradual emancipation; and with the aid they 
can have from the General Government they may be 
nearly as well off, in this respect, as if the present 
trouble had not occurred, and much better off than they 
can possibly be if the contest continues persistently. 

As to any dread of my having a "purpose to enslave 
or exterminate the whites of the South," I can scarcely 
believe that such dread exists. It is too absurd. I 



360 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

believe you can be my personal witness that no man is 
less to be dreaded for undue severity in any case. 

If the friends you mention really wish to have peace 
upon the old terms^ they should act at once. Every 
day makes the case more difficult. 

They can so act with entire safety, so far as I am 
concerned. 

I think you- had better not make this letter public; 
but you may rely confidently on my standing by what- 
ever I have said in it. Please write me if anything 
more comes to light. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In the English cotton manufacturing sections, the war, by 
cutting oif the supply of cotton, had caused great distress. 
Thousands were without employment, and suffering was wide- 
spread. It was among this very group, however, that the 
North found its stanchest Enghsh friends. On account of 
their hatred of slavery, they bitterly opposed any action on the 
])art of the British government favorable to the South. At 
Manchester, one of the centers of the cotton industry, a mass 
meeting of six thousand workingmen was held on New Year's 
Eve to celebrate the Emancipation Proclamation. An ad- 
dress and resolutions were adopted and sent to Lincoln, who 
thus answered it: 

REPLY TO THE WORKINGMEN OF MANCHESTER 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, January 19, 1863 
To THE Workingmen of Manchester: 

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the 
address and resolutions which you sent me on the eve 
of the New Year. When I came, on the 4th of March, 
1861, through a free and constitutional election, to 
preside in the government of the United States, the 
country was found at the verge of civil war. Whatever 
might have been the cause, or whosesoever the faulty 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 361 

one duty paramount to all others was before me ; namely, 
to maintain and preserve at once the Constitution and 
the integrity of the Federal Republic. A conscientious 
purpose to perform this duty is the key to all the meas- 
ures of administration which have been^ and to all which 
will hereafter be, pursued. Under our frame of govern- 
ment and my official oath, I could not depart from this 
purpose if I would. It is not always in the power of 
governments to enlarge or restrict the scope of moral 
results which follow the policies that they may deem it 
necessary for the public safety from time to time to 
adopt. 

I have understood well that the duty of self-preserva- 
tion rests solely with the American people; but I have 
at the same time been aware that favor or disfavor of 
foreign nations might have a material influence in en- 
larging or prolonging the struggle with disloyal men 
in which the country is engaged. A fair examination 
of history has served to authorize a belief that the past 
actions and influences of the United States were gen- 
erally regarded as having been beneficial toward man- 
kind. I have therefore reckoned upon the forbearance 
of nations. Circumstances, to some of which you kindly 
allude, induce me especially to expect that if justice 
and good faith should be practiced by the United States, 
they would encounter no hostile influence on the part 
of Great Britain. It is now a pleasant duty to acknowl- 
edge the demonstration you have given of your desire 
that a spirit of amity and peace tow'ard this country 
may prevail in the councils of your queen, who is re- 
spected and esteemed in your own country only more 
than she is by the kindred nation which has its home 
on this side of the Atlantic. 

I know and deeply deplore the sufferings which the 
workingmen at Manchester, and in all Europe, are called 
to endure in this crisis. It has been often and studiously 
represented that the attempt to overthrow this govern- 



362 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

ment^ which was built upon the foundation of human 
rights, and to substitute for it one which should rest 
exclusively on the basis of human slavery, was likely to 
obtain the favor of Europe. Through the action of our 
dislo^^al citizens, the workingmen of Europe have been 
subjected to severe trials, for the purpose of forcing 
their sanction to that attempt. Under the circumstances, 
I cannot but regard your decisive utterances upon the 
question as an instance of sublime Christian heroism, 
which has not been surpassed in any age or in any coun- 
try. It is indeed an energetic and reinspiring assurance 
of the inherent power of truth, and of the ultimate and 
universal triumph of justice, humanity, and freedom. 
I do not doubt that the sentiments you have expressed 
will be sustained by 3^our great nation ; and, on the other 
hand, I have no hesitation in assuring you that they 
will excite admiration, esteem, and the most reciprocal 
feelings of friendship among the American people. I 
hail this interchange of sentiment, therefore, as an 
augury that whatever else may happen, whatever mis- 
fortune may befall your country or my own, the peace 
and friendship which now exist between the two nations 
will be, as it shall be my desire to make them, perpetual. 

In November Lincoln removed General McClellan from 
command of the Army of the Potomac, replacing him with 
General Ambrose E. Burnside, who was crushingly defeated 
at Fredericksburg in December and was unable thereafter to 
restore the morale of his army. On January 25, Lincoln, over 
the protest of Secretary Stanton and General Halleck, ordered 
General Joseph Hooker to relieve General Burnside. Hooker 
had been a corps commander under McClellan and Burnside, 
and had been very open in his scathing criticism of both. The 
next day Lincoln followed the appointment with this remark- 
able letter; 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 363 

TO GENEBA^L JOSEPH HOOKER 

Executive Mansion, 

Washington, D. C, January 26, 1863 
Major-General Hooker. 

General: I have placed you at the head of the Army 
of the Potomac. Of course I have done this upon what 
appear to me to be sufficient reasons, and yet I think 
it best for you to know that there are some things in 
regard to which I am not quite satisfied with you. I 
believe you to be a brave and skillful soldier, which of 
course I like. I also believe you do not mix politics 
with your profession, in which you are right. You have 
confidence in yourself, which is a valuable if not an 
indispensable quality. You are ambitious, which, within 
reasonable bounds, does good rather than harm; but I 
think that during General Burnside's command of the 
army you have taken counsel of your ambition and 
thwarted him as much as you could, in which you did 
a ^reat wrong to the country and to a most meritorious 
and honorable brother officer. I have heard, in such a 
way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both 
the army and the government needed a dictator. Of 
course it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have 
given you the command. Only those generals who gain 
successes can set up dictators. What I now ask of you 
is military success, and I will risk the dictatorship. The 
government will support you to the utmost of its ability, 
which is neither more nor less than it has done and will 
do for all commanders. I much fear that the spirit 
which you have aided to infuse into the army, of criticiz- 
ing their commander and withholding confidence from 
him, will now turn upon you. I shall assist you as far 
as I can to put it down. Neither you nor Napoleon, if 
he were alive again, could get any good out of an army 



364 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

while such a spirit prevails in it; and now beware of 
rashness. Beware of rashness, but with energ\^ and 
sleepless vigilance go forward and give us victories. 
Yours \try truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Stanton and Halleck had wanted the command of the Army 
of the Potomac given to a promising Western general, then in 
command of the Army of the Cumberland, William S. Rose- 
crans. This letter of Lincoln, notable for its frankness, 
combined with tact and patience, indicates that Lincoln was 
wise in declining to take their advice. 

TO GENERAL WILLIAM ROSECRANS 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, March 17, 1863 
Major-General Rosecrans. 

My dear Sir: I have just received your telegram 
saying that the "Secretary of War telegraphed after 
the Battle of Stone River, 'Anything you and your com- 
mand want you can have,' " and then specifying several 
things you have requested and have not received. 

The promise of the Secretary, as you state it, is cer- 
tainly pretty broad^ nevertheless it accords with the 
feeling of the whole government here toward you. I 
know not a single enemy of yours here. Still the promise 
must have a reasonable construction. We know you will 
not purposely make an unreasonable request, nor persist 
in one after it shall appear to be such. Now, as to the 
matter of a paymaster, you desired one to be per- 
manently attached to your army, and, as I understand, 
desired that Major Larned should be the man. This 
was denied you; and you seem to think it was denied 
partly to disoblige you and partly to disoblige Major 
Larned — the latter, as you suspect, at the instance of 
Paymaster-General Andrews. On the contrary, the Sec- 
retary of War assures me the request was refused on no 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 355 

personal ground whatever^ but because to grant it would 
derange^ and substantially break up, the whole pay 
system as now organized, and so organized on very full 
consideration and sound reason, as believed. There is 
powerful temptation in money ; and it was and is be- 
lieved that nothing can prevent the paymasters speculat- 
ing upon the soldiers but a systein by which each is to 
pay certain regiments so soon after he has notice that 
he is to pay those particular regiments that he has no 
time or opportunity to lay plans for speculating upon 
them. This precaution is all lost if paymasters re- 
spectively are to serve permanently with the same regi- 
ments, and pay them over and over during the war. No 
special application of this has been intended to be made 
to Major Larned or to your army. And as to General 
Andrews, I have in another connection felt a little 
aggrieved at what seemed to be his implicit following 
the advice and suggestions of Major Larned — so ready 
are we all to cry out and ascribe motives when our own 
toes are pinched. 

Now as to your request that your commission should 
date from December, 1861. Of course you expected to 
gain something by this; but you should remember that 
precisely so much as you should gain by it others would 
lose by it. If the thing you sought had been exclusively 
ours, we would have given it cheerfully; but, being the 
right of other men, we having a merely arbitrary power 
over it, the taking it from them and giving it to you 
became a more delicate matter and more deserving of 
consideration. Truth to speak, I do not appreciate this 
matter of rank on paper as you officers do. The world 
will not forget that you fought the Battle of Stone River, 
and it will never care a fig whether you rank General 
Grant on paper, or he so ranks you. 

As to the appointment of an aide contrary to your 
wishes, I knew nothing of it until I received your dis- 
patch ; and the Secretary of War tells me he has known 



3G6 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

nothing of it, but will trace it out. The examination of 
course will extend to the case of R. S, Thomas, whom 
you say you wish appointed. 

And now be assured you wrong both yourself and us 
when you even suspect there is not the best disposition 
on the part of us all here to oblige you. 
Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

The attitude of the New York state government was, of 
course, most important to the Union. Horatio Seymour, a 
War Democrat, had been elected governor in 1863. Lincoln 
wrote him this letter in the hope of establishing close rela- 
tions with him. 

TO GOVERNOR HORATIO SEYMOUR 

[Private and Confidential] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, March 23, 1863 
His Excellency Governor Seymour. 

Dear Sir: You and I are substantially strangers, 
and I write this chiefly that we may become better 
acquainted. I, for the time being, am at the head of a 
nation which is in great peril, and you are at the head 
of the greatest state of that nation. As to maintaining 
the nation's life and integrity, I assume and believe there 
cannot be a difference of purpose between you and me. 
If we should differ as to the means, it is important that 
such difference should be as small as possible; that it 
should not be enhanced by unjust suspicions on one side 
or the other. In the performance of my duty the co- 
operation of your state, as that of others, is needed — 
in fact, is indispensable. This alone is a sufficient rea- 
son why I should wish to be at a good understanding 
with you. Please write me at least as long a letter as 
this, of course saying in it just what you think fit. 
Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 367 

The following proclamation is notable for its expression of 
deep and reverent feeling, clothed in the most appropriate 
language. 



PROCLAMATION FOB A NATIONAL FAST DAY 
[March 30, 1863] 

Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly 
recognizing the supreme authority and just government 
of Almighty God in all the affairs of men and of nations, 
has by a resolution requested the President to designate 
and set apart a day for national prayer and humiliation: 

And whereas, it is the duty of nations as well as of 
men to own their dependence upon the overruling power 
of God; to confess their sins and transgressions in 
humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine 
repentance will lead to mercy and pardon ; and to recog- 
nize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures 
and proven by all history, that those nations only are 
blessed whose God is the Lord: 

And insomuch as we know that, by His divine law, 
nations, like individuals, are subjected to punishments 
and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear 
that the awful calamity of civil war which now desolates 
the land may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for 
our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our 
national reformation as a whole people? We have been 
the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We 
have been preserved, these many years, in peace and 
prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and 
power as no other nation has ever grown; but we have 
forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand 
which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched 
and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in 
the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings 
were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of 



368 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have 
become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeem- 
ing and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God 
that made us: 

It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the 
offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray 
for clemency and forgiveness: 

Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and 
full}^ concurring in the views, of the Senate, I do by 
this my proclamation designate and set apart Thursday, 
the 30th day of April, 1863, as a day of national humilia- 
tion, fasting, and prayer. And I do hereby request all 
the people to abstain on that day from their ordinary 
secular pursuits, and to unite at their several places of 
public worship and their respective homes in keeping the 
day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble dis- 
charge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occa- 
sion. All this being done in sincerity and truth, let us 
then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the divine 
teachings, that the united cry of the nation will be heard 
on high, and answered with blessings no less than the 
pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our 
now divided and suffering country to its former happy 
condition of unity and peace. 

In witness, etc. 

Abraham Lincoln 

By the President: 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State 



General Hooker learned little from Lincoln's first letter, 
and he showed little of the quality desired by Lincoln, who had 
constantly to urge him on. These two later communications 
give interesting views of Lincoln's hard common sense and of 
his opinions as to the proper military strategy. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 3^9 

TO GENERA'L JOSEPH HOOKER 

[Telegram] 

Washington, June 5, 1863. 4 p. m. 
Major General Hooker: Yours of today was- 
received an hour ago. So much of professional military 
skill is requisite to answer it that I have turned the task 
over to General Halleck. He promises to perform it 
with his utmost care. I have but one idea which I 
think worth suggesting to j^ou, and that is^, in case you 
find Lee coming to the north of the Rappahannock, I 
would by no means cross to the south of it. If he should 
leave a rear force at Fredericksburg, tempting you to 
fall upon it, it would fight in entrenchments and have 
you at disadvantage, and so, man for man, worst you at 
that point, while his main force would in some way be 
getting an advantage of you northward. In one word, 
I would not take any risk of being entangled upon the 
river, like an ox jumped half over a fence and liable to 
be torn by dogs front and rear without a fair chance to 
gore one way or kick the other. If Lee would come to 
my side of the river, I would keep on the same side, and 
fight him or act on the defense, according as might be 
my estimate of his strength relatively to my own. But 
these are mere suggestions which I desire to be controlled 
by the judgment of yourself and General Halleck, 

A. Lincoln 

TO GENERAL JOSEPH HOOKER 

[Telegram] 

Washington, June 10, 1863 

Major General Hooker: Your long dispatch of 

today is just received. If left to me I would not go 

south of the Rappahannock upon Lee's moving north 

of it. If you had Richmond invested today, you would 



370 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

not be able to take it in twenty days; meanwhile your 
communications, and with them your army, would be 
ruined. I think Lee's army, and not Richmond, is your 
true objective point. If he comes toward the upper 
Potomac, follow on his flank and on his inside track, 
shortening your lines while he lengthens his. Fight 
him, too, when opportunity oifers. If he stays where 
he is, fret him and fret him. 

A. Lincoln 

Another characteristic message to General Hooker follows: 

TO GENERAL JOSEPH HOOKER 

[Telegram] 

Washington, June 14, 1863 
Major General Hooker: So far as we can make 
out here, the enemy have Milroy surrounded at Win- 
chester, and Tyler at Martinsburg. If they could hold 
out a few days, could you help them? If the head of 
Lee's army is at Martinsburg and the tail of it on the 
plank road between Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, 
the animal must be very slim somewhere. Could you 
not break him? 

A. Lincoln: 

The tide of the war turned in July, 1863, with the victories 
at Gettysburg and Vicksburg. Lincoln's letter of acknowl- 
edgment to General U. S. Grant is characteristic. 

TO GENERAL U. S. GRANT 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, July 13, 1863 
Major General Grant. 

My dear General : I do not remember that you and 
I ever met personally. I write this now as a grateful 
acknowledgment for the almost inestimable service you 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 371 

have done the country. I wish to say a word further. 
When you first reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I 
thought you should do what you finally did — march the 
troops across the neck, run the batteries with the trans- 
ports, and thus go below; and I never had any faith, 
except a general hope that j^ou knew better than I, that 
the Yazoo Pass expedition and the like could succeed. 
When you got below and took Port Gibson, Grand Gulf, 
and vicinity, I thought you should go down the river and 
join General Banks, and when you turned northward, 
east of the Big Black, I feared it was a mistake. I 
now wish to make, the personal acknowledgment that 
you were right and I was wrong. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 



In August he wrote a note to James H. Hackett, a well- 
known actor, in which he expressed his preferences among the 
plays of Shakespeare. 



TO JAMES H. HACKETT 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, August 17, 1863 
James H. Hackett, Esq. 

My dear Sir: Months ago I should have acknowl- 
edged the receipt of your book and accompanying kind 
note ; and I now have to beg your pardon for not having 
done so. 

For one of my age I have seen very little of the 
drama. The first presentation of Falstaif I ever saw 
was yours here, last winter or spring. Perhaps the best 
compliment I can pay is to say, as I truh^ can, I am 
very anxious to see it again. Some of Shakespeare's 
plays I have never read; while others I have gone over 
perhaps as frequently as any unprofessional reader. 



372 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Among the latter are "Lear/' "Richard III," "Henry 
VII I/' "Hamlet," and especially "Macbeth." I think 
nothing equals "Macbeth." It is wonderful. 

Unlike you gentlemen of the profession, I think the 
soliloquy in "Hamlet" commencing "Oh, my offense is 
rank" surpasses that commencing "To be or not to be." 
But pardon this small attempt at criticism. I should 
like to hear you pronounce the opening speech of 
Richard III. Will you not soon visit Washington again? 
If you do, please call and let me make your personal 
acquaintance. 

.Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In June, before the victories at Vicksburg and Gettys- 
burg, a meeting had been held in Springfield to censure the 
administration and to discuss the possibility of seceding and 
establishing a Northwestern Confederacy. In August, James 
C. Conkling, a close friend of Lincoln's, invited him to come to 
Springfield to speak at a meeting of unconditional Union men 
to be held in the interest of "law and order and constitutional 
government." Lincoln replied with a rather remarkable argu- 
ment which he called a "stump speech." It won instant ap- 
proval from the whole country. 



TO JAMES C. G ON KLIN G 
[Private] 

War Department, 
Washington City, D. C, August 17, 1863 
iNIv DEAR Conkling: I cannot leave here now. 
Herewith is a letter instead. You are one of the best 
public readers. I have but one suggestion — read it very 
slowly. And now God bless you, and all good Union 
men. 

Yours as ever, 

A. Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 373 

TO JAMES C. CON KLIN G 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, August 26, 1863 
Hon. James C. Conkling. 

]\Iy dear Sir: Your letter inviting me to attend a 
mass meeting of unconditional Union men, to be held at 
the capital of Illinois on the 3d day of September, has 
been received. It would be very agreeable to me to 
thus meet my old friends at my own home, but I cannot 
just now be absent from here so long as a visit there 
would require. 

The meeting is to be of all those who maintain uncon- 
ditional devotion to the Union; and I am sure my old 
political friends will thank me for tendering, as I do, the 
nation's gratitude to those and other noble men whom no 
partisan malice or partisan hope can make false to the 
nation's life. 

There are those who are dissatisfied with me. To 
such I would say: You desire peace, and you blame 
me that we do not have it. But how can we attain it? 
There are but three conceivable ways: First, to sup- 
press the rebellion by force of arms. This I am trying 
to do. Are you for it? If you are, so far we are 
agreed. If you are not for it, a second way is to give 
up the Union. I am against this. Are you for it? 
If you are, you should say so plainly. If you are not 
for force, nor yet for dissolution, there only remains 
some imaginable compromise. I do not believe any com- 
promise embracing the maintenance of the Union is now 
possible. All I learn leads to a directly opposite belief. 
The strength of the rebellion is its military, its army. 
That army dominates all the country and all the people 
within its range. Any offer of terms made by any man 
or men within that range, in opposition to that army, is 
simply nothing for the present, because such man or 
men have no power whatever to enforce their side of a 
compromise if one were made with them. 



374 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

To illustrate: Suppose refugees from the South and 
peace men of the North get together in convention, and 
frame and proclaim a compromise embracing a restora- 
tion of the Union. In what way can that compromise 
be used to keep Lee's army out of Pennsylvania? 
Meade's army can keep Lee's army out of Pennsylvania, 
and, I think, can ultimately drive it out of existence. 
But no paper compromise to which the controllers of 
Lee's army are not agreed can at all aifect that army. 
In an effort at such compromise we should waste time 
which the enemy would improve to our disadvantage; 
and that would be all. A compromise, to be effective, 
must be made either with those who control the rebel 
army, or with the people first liberated from the domi- 
nation of that army by the success of our own army. 
Now, allow me to assure you that no word or intimation 
from that rebel army, or from any of the men con- 
trolling it, in relation to any peace compromise, has ever 
come to my knowledge or belief. All charges and 
insinuations to the contrary are deceptive and ground- 
less. And I promise you that if any such proposition 
shall hereafter come, it shall not be rejected and kept a 
secret from you. I freely acknowledge myself the 
servant of the people, according to the bond of service — 
the United States Constitution — and that, as such, I am 
responsible to them. 

But to be plain. You are dissatisfied with me about 
the negro. Quite likely there is a difference of opinion 
between you and myself upon that subject. I certainly 
wish that all men could be free, while I suppose you do 
not. Yet, I have neither adopted nor proposed any 
measure which is not consistent with even your view, 
provided you are for the Union. I suggested compen- 
sated emancipation, to which you replied you wished not 
to be taxed to buy negroes. But I had not asked you 
to be taxed to buy negroes, except in such way as to 
save you from greater taxation to save the Union exclu- 
sively by other means. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 375 

You dislike the Emancijoation Proclamation, and per- 
haps would have it retracted. You say it is unconsti- 
tutional. I think differently. I think the Constitution 
invests its commander-in-chief with the law of war in 
time of war. The most that can be said — if so much — 
is that slaves are property. Is there — has there ever 
been — any question that, by the law of war, property, 
both of enemies and friends, may be taken when needed ? 
And is it not needed whenever taking it helps us, or 
hurts the enemy .^ Armies, the world over, destroy ene- 
mies' property when they cannot use it ; and even des- 
troy their own to keep it from the enemy. Civilized 
belligerents do all in their power to help themselves or 
hurt the enemy, except a few things regarded as bar- 
barous or cruel. Among the exceptions are the mas- 
sacre of vanquished foes and noncombatants, male and 
female. 

But the Proclamation, as law, either is valid or is not 
valid. If it is not valid, it needs no retraction. If it 
is valid, it cannot be retracted any more than the dead 
can be brought to life. Some of you profess to think 
its retraction would operate favorably for the Union. 
Why better after the retraction than before the issue? 
There was more than a year and a half of trial to sup- 
press the rebellion before the proclamation issued; the 
last one hundred days of which passed under an explicit 
notice that it was coming, unless averted by those in 
revolt returning to their allegiance. The war has cer- 
tainly progressed as favorably for us since the issue of 
the proclamation as before. 

I know, as fully as one can know the opinions of others, 
that some of the commanders of our armies in the field, 
who have given us our most important successes, believe 
the emancipation policy and the use of the colored troops 
constitute the heaviest blow yet dealt to the rebellion, 
and that at least one of these important successes could 
not have been achieved when it was, but for the aid of 
black soldiers. Among the commanders holding these 



376 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

views are some who have never had any affinity with 
what is called abolitionism, or with Republican party 
politics, but who hold them purely as military opinions. 
I submit these opinions as being entitled to some weight 
against the objections often urged that emancipation and 
arming the blacks are unwise as military measures, and 
were not adopted as suqh in good faith. 

You say you will not fight to free negroes. Some of 
them seem willing to fight for you; but no matter. 
Fight you, then, exclusivel}^, to save the Union. I issued 
the Proclamation on purpose to aid you in saving the 
Union. Whenever you shall have conquered all resist- 
ance to the Union, if I shall urge you to continue fight- 
ing, it will be an apt time then for you to declare you 
will not fight to free negroes. 

I thought that in your struggle for the Union, to 
whatever extent the negroes should cease helping the 
enemy, to that extent it weakened the enemy in his resist- 
ance to you. Do you think differently ? I thought that 
whatever negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves just 
so much less for white soldiers to do in saving the 
Union. Does it appear otherwise to you? But negroes, 
like other people, act upon motives. Why should they 
do anything for us if we will do nothing for them? If 
they stake their lives for us they must be prompted by 
the strongest motive, even the promise of freedom. And 
the promise, being made, must be kept. 

The signs look better. The Father of Waters again 
goes unvexed to the sea. Thanks to the great North- 
west for it. Nor yet wholly to them. Three hundred 
miles up they met New England, Empire, Keystone, 
and Jersey, hewing their way right and left. The sunny 
South, too, in more colors than one, also lent a hand. 
On the spot, their part of the history was jotted down 
in black and white. The job was a great national one, 
and let none be banned who bore an honorable part in 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 377 

it. And while those who have cleared the great river 
may well be proud, even that is not all. It is hard to 
say that anything has been more bravely and well done 
than at Antietam, Murfreesboro, Gettysburg, and on 
many fields of lesser note. Nor must Uncle Sam's 
webfeet be forgotten. At all the wa-tery margins they 
have been present. Not only on the deep sea, the broad 
bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow, muddy 
baj^ou, and wherever the ground was a little damp, they 
have been and made their tracks. Thanks to all: for 
the great republic — for the principle it lives by and 
keeps alive — for man's vast future — thanks to all. 

Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I hope it 
will come soon, and come to stay; and so come as to be 
worth the keeping in all future time. It will then have 
been proved that among free men there can be no suc- 
cessful appeal from the ballot to the bullet, and that 
they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case 
and pay the cost. And then there will be some black 
men who can remember that with silent tongue, and 
clenched teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bayonet, 
they have helped mankind on to this great consummation, 
while I fear there will be some white ones unable to 
forget that with malignant heart and deceitful speech 
they strove to hinder it. 

Still, let us not be oversanguine of a speedy final 
triumph. Let us be quite sober. Let us diligently 
apply the means, never doubting that a just God, in Hlis 
own good time, will give us the rightful result. 

Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Secretary Chase had never learned the lesson Seward had 
in regard to Lincoln and consequently was never satisfied 
with his official acts. The following is the reply of Lincoln to 
one of Chase's radical suggestions: 



378 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

TO SALMON P. CHASE 

[Draft of a Letter] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, September 2, 1863 
Hon. Salmon P. Chase. 

My dear Sir: Knowing ^^our great anxiety that 
the Emancipation Proclamation shall now be applied to 
certain parts of Virginia and Louisiana which were 
exempted from it last January, I state briefly what 
appear to me to be difficulties in the way of such a step. 
The original proclamation has no constitutional or legal 
justification, except as a military measure. The exemp- 
tions were made because the military necessity did not 
apply to the exempted localities. Nor does that neces- 
sity apply to them now any more than it did then. If 
I take the step, must I not do so without the argument 
of military necessity, and so without any argument 
except the one that I think the measure politically expe- 
dient and morally right .^ Would I not thus give up all 
footing upon the Constitution or law? Would I not 
thus be in the boundless field of absolutism? Could this 
pass unnoticed or unresisted? Could it fail to be per- 
ceived that without any further stretch I might do the 
same in Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, Tennessee, and 
Missouri, and even change any law in any state? Would 
not many of our own friends shrink away appalled? 
Would it not lose us the elections, and with them the 
very cause we seek to advance? 

[A. Lincoln] 



The following proclamation is notable for its establishment 
of a precedent for a National Thanksgiving Day. Prior to 
this, it had been celebrated only after the proclamations of 
governors of some of the states: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 379 

PROCLAMATION FOR THANKSGIVING 

[October 3, 1863] 

The year that is drawing toward its close has been 
filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful 
skies. To these bounties^ which are so constantly 
enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from 
which they comC;, others have been added, which are of 
so extraordinary a nature that they cannot fail to pene- 
trate and soften the heart which is habitually insensible 
to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. 

In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude 
and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign 
states to invite and provoke their aggressions, peace has 
been preserved with all nations, order has been main- 
tained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and 
harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater 
of military conflict; while that theater has been greatly 
contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the 
Union. 

Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the 
fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have 
not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship; the ax 
has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the 
mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, 
have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. 
Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the 
waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the 
battlefield, and the country, rejoicing in the conscious- 
ness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to 
expect continuance of years with large increase of 
freedom. 

No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal 
hand worked out these great things. They are the gra- 
cious gifts of the most high God, who, while dealing with 
us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered 
mercy. 

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should 



380 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as 
with one heart and one voice by the whole American 
people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow citizens in 
every part of the United States, and also those who are 
at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to 
set apart and observe the last Thursday of November 
next as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent 
Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend 
to them that, while offering up the ascriptions j ustly due 
to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, 
they do also, with humble penitence for our national 
perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender 
care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourn- 
ers, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which 
we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the 
interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds 
of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be con- 
sistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment 
of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union. 
In testimony, etc. 

A. Lincoln 
By the President: 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State 

Hackett published the President's letter* and the Nerv York 
Herald took occasion to make a savage comment upon it, sneer- 
ing at the President and ridiculing his taste. This was imitated 
by other papers. They hurt Lincoln considerably, but he wrote 
Hackett: 

TO JAMES H. HACKETT 
[Private] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, November 2, 186S 
James H. Hackett. 

My dear Sir: Yours of October 22 is received, as 
also was in due course that of October 3. I look for- 
*See page 371. 



I 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 381 

ward with pleasure to the fulfillment of the promise 
made in the former. 

Give yourself no uneasiness on the subject mentioned 
in that of the 22d. 

My note to you I certainly did not expect to see in 
print; yet I have not been much shocked by the news- 
paper comments upon it. Those comments constitute a 
fair specimen of what has occurred to me through life. 
I have endured a great deal of ridicule without much 
malice; and have received a great deal of kindness, not 
quite free from ridicule. I am used to it. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Soon after the battle of Gettysburg it was determined to 
set aside a part of the battlefield for a national cemetery. 
Edward Everett, noted as a great orator, was invited to make 
the address, and on November 2, Lincoln was invited to "set 
apart these grounds to their sacred use by a few appropriate 
remarks." 

Lincoln was so oppressed by his duties during the inter- 
vening time that he was unable to finish his address until he 
was on the way to Gettysburg, when he jotted down with a 
pencil part of the speech. Mary R. S. Andrews in "The Per- 
fect Tribute" strikingly describes the occasion: 

"At eleven o'clock on the morning of ... . November 19, 
1863, a vast, silent multitude billowed like waves of the sea over 
what had been not long before the battlefield of Gettysburg. 
There were wounded soldiers there who had beaten their way 
four months before through a singing fire across these quiet 
fields, who had seen the men die who were buried here; there 
were troops, grave and responsible, who must soon go again into 
battle; there were the rank and file of an everyday American 
gathering in surging thousands; and above them all, on the 
open-air platform, there were the leaders of the land, the 
pilots who today lifted a hand from the wheel of the ship of 
state to salute the memory of those gone down in the storm. 
Most of the men in that group of honor are now passed over 
to the majority, but their names are not dead in American 



382 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

history — great ghosts who walk still in the annals of their coun- 
try, their flesh-and-blood faces were turned attentively that 
bright, still November afternoon toward the orator of the da}^ 
whose voice held the audience." 

Everett spoke for two hours, delivering a polished, able, and 
impressive oration of the type then admired in the United 
States. Nearly all the newspapers gave extended editorial 
comment to it the next day. Lincoln followed with the im- 
mortal words which scarcely affected the vast crowd except with 
a general feeling of disappointment. Everett alone seems to 
have seen the speech in the light that it has later been viewed. 
When read, it Avas received very differently and in time was 
recognized for the masterpiece that it really is. 

THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS 

[Delivered at the dedication of the National Cemetery, 
November 19, 1863] 

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought 
forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Lib- 
erty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are 
created equal. 

Now we are engaged in a great civil war; testing 
whether that nation^ or any nation so conceived and so 
dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great 
battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a 
portion of that field as a final resting-place for those 
who here gave their lives that that nation might live. 
It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do 
this. 

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate — we can- 
not consecrate — we cannot hallow — this ground. The 
brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have 
consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or de- 
tract. The world will little note, nor long remember, 
what we say here, but it can never forget what they did 
here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here 
to the unfinished work which they who fought here have 
thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 333 

dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that 
from these honored dead we take increased devotion to 
that cause for which they gave the last full measure of 
devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead 
shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, 
shall have a new birth of freedom ; and that government 
of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not 
perish from the earth. 

From the very beginning of the war Lincoln had pondered 
over the question of reconstruction. As has been seen, he 
took steps in the direction of reconstruction in 1863 when he 
appointed military governors for several Southern states where 
he thought there was sufficient Union sentiment to warrant it. 
Now, in a number of the seceded states, notably Louisiana, 
Arkansas, and Tennessee, the Union forces controlled enough 
territory to make an attempt at restoration really worth while. 

He had two main reasons for his anxiety to get reconstruc- 
tion started. One was his belief that the moral effect upon 
the rest of the South would be great enough to shorten the 
war. The other was his desire to get it under way before those 
in the North who desired to impose harsh terms could formu- 
late a policy and gain any popular support. 

On December 8, 1863, he issued a proclamation of amnesty 
and reconstruction, and on the same day, outlined his plan in 
his annual message to Congress. 

PROCLAMATION OF AMNESTY AND 
RECpNSTR UCTION 

[December 8, 1863] 

Whereas, in and by the Constitution of the United 
States, it is provided that the President "shall have 
power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses 
against the United States, except in cases of impeach- 
ment"; and 

Whereas a rebellion now exists whereby the loyal 
state governments of several states have for a long time 
been subverted, and many persons have committed, and 
are now guilty of, treason against the United States ; and 



384 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Whereas, with reference to said rebellion and treason, 
laws have been enacted by Congress, declaring for- 
feitures and confiscation of property and liberation of 
slaves, all upon terms and conditions therein stated, and 
also declaring that the President was thereby authorized 
at any time thereafter, by proclamation, to extend to 
persons who may have participated in the existing rebel- 
lion, in any state or part thereof, pardon and amnesty, 
with such exceptions and at such times and on such 
conditions as he may deem expedient for the public wel- 
fare; and 

Whereas the congressional declaration for limited and 
conditional pardon accords with well-established judi- 
cial exposition of the pardoning power; and 

Whereas, with reference to said rebellion, the Presi- 
dent of the United States has issued several proclama- 
tions, with provisions in regard to the liberation of 
slaves ; and 

Whereas it is now desired by some persons hereto- 
fore engaged in said rebellion to resume their allegi- 
ance to the United States, and to reinaugurate loyal state 
governments within and for their respective states; 
therefore 

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, 
do proclaim, declare, and make known to all persons 
who have, directly or by implication, participated in the 
existing rebellion, except as hereinafter excepted, that a 
full pardon is hereby granted to them and each of them, 
with restoration of all rights of property, except as to 
slaves, and in property cases where rights of third par- 
ties shall have intervened, and upon the condition that 
every such person shall take and subscribe an oath, and 
thenceforward keep and maintain said oath inviolate; 
and which oath shall be registered for permanent preser- 
vation, and shall be of the tenor and effect following, 
to wit: 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 335 

"I, . . . ., do solemnly swear, in presence of Almighty 
God, that I will henceforth faithfully support, protect, 
and defend the Constitution of the United States, and 
the union of the states thereunder; and that I will, in 
like manner, abide by and faithfully support all acts of 
Congress passed during the existing rebellion with 
reference to slaves, so long and so far as not repealed, 
modified, or held void by Congress, or by decision of the 
Supreme Court; and that I will in like manner, abide 
by and faithfully support all proclamations of the Presi- 
dent made during the existing rebellion having reference 
to slaves, so long and so far as not modified or declared 
void bv decision of the Supreme Court. So help me 
God." ' 

The persons exempted from the benefits of the fore- 
going provisions are all who are, or shall have been 
civil or diplomatic officers or agents of the so-called 
Confederate Government; all who have left judicial 
stations under the United States to aid the rebellion; 
all who are or shall have been military or naval officers 
of said so-called Confederate Government above the rank 
of colonel in the army or of lieutenant in the navy; all 
who have left seats in the United States Congress to aid 
the rebellion; all who resigned commissions in the army 
or navy of the United States and afterward aided the 
rebellion; and all who have engaged in any way in 
treating colored persons, or white persons in charge of 
such, otherwise than lawfully as prisoners of war, and 
which persons may have been found in the United States 
service as soldiers, seamen, or in any other capacity. 

And I do further proclaim, declare, and make known 
that whenever in any of the states of Arkansas, Texas, 
Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, 
Florida, South Carolina, and North Carolina, a number 
of persons, not less than one-tenth in number of the 



386 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

votes cast in such state at the presidential election of 
the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
sixty, each having taken the oath aforesaid and not hav- 
ing since violated it, and being a qualified voter by the 
election law of the state existing immediately before the 
so-called act of secession, and excluding all others, shall 
reestablish a state government which shall be republi- 
can, and in no wise contravening said oath, such shall be 
recognized as the true government of the state, and the 
state shall receive thereunder the benefits of the con- 
stitutional provision which declares that "The United 
States shall guarantee to every state in this Union a 
republican form of government, and shall protect each 
of them against invasion; and, on application of the 
legislature, or the executive (when the legislature cannot 
be convened), against domestic violence." 

And I do further proclaim, declare, and make known, 
that any provision which may be adopted by such state 
government in relation to the freed people of such state, 
which shall recognize and declare their permanent free- 
dom, provide for their education, and which may yet be 
consistent as a temporary arrangement with their pres- 
ent condition as a laboring, landless, and homeless class, 
will not be objected to by the national Executive. 

And it is suggested as not improper that, in con- 
structing a loyal state government in any state, the name 
of the state, the boundary, the subdivisions, the consti- 
tution, and the general code of laws, as before the rebel- 
lion, be maintained, subject only to the modifications 
made necessary by the conditions hereinbefore stated, 
and such others, if any, not contravening said conditions, 
and which may be deemed expedient by those framing 
the new state government. 

To avoid misunderstanding, it may be proper to say 
that this proclamation, so far as it relates to state gov- 
ernments, has no reference to states wherein loyal state 
governments have all the while been maintained. 

And, for the same reason, it may be proper to further 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 387 

say, that whether members sent to Congress from any 
state shall be admitted to seats, constitutionally rests 
exclusively with the respective houses, and not to any 
extent with the Executive. And still further, that this 
proclamation is intended to present the people of the 
states wherein the national authority has been sus- 
pended, and loyal state governments have been sub- 
verted, a mode in and by which the national authority 
and loyal state governments may be reestablished within 
said states, or in any of them; and while the mode pre- 
sented is the best the Executive can suggest, with his 
present impressions, it must not be understood that no 
other possible mode would be acceptable. 

Given under my hand, etc. 

Abraham Lincoln 
By the President: 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State 

EXTRACT FROM ANNUA^L MESSAGE TO CONGRESS 

[December 8, 1863] 

When Congress assembled a year ago, the war had 
already lasted nearly twenty months, and there had been 
many conflicts on both land and sea with varying results. 
The rebellion had been pressed back into reduced limits ; 
yet the tone of public feeling and opinion, at home and 
abroad, was not satisfactory. With other signs, the 
popular elections, then just past, indicated uneasiness 
among ourselves, while, amid much that was cold and 
menacing, the kindest words coming from Europe were 
uttered in accents of pity that we were too blind to sur- 
render a hopeless cause. Our commerce was suifering 
greatly by a few armed vessels built upon, and fur- 
nished from, foreign shores, and we were threatened 
with such additions from the same quarter as would 
sweep our trade from the sea and raise our blockade. 
We had failed to elicit from European governments 



388 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

anything hopeful upon this subject. The preliminary 
emancipation proclamation, issued in September, was 
running its assigned period to the beginning of the new 
year. A month later the final proclamation came, 
including the announcement that colored men of suitable 
condition would be received into the war service. 

The policy of emancipation, and of employing black 
soldiers, gave to the future a new aspect, about which 
hope, and fear, and doubt contended in uncertain con- 
flict. According to our political system, as a matter of 
civil administration, the general government had no law- 
ful power to effect emancipation in any state, and for a 
long time it had been hoped that the rebellion could be 
suppressed without resorting to it as a military measure. 
It was all the while deemed possible that the necessity 
for it might come, and that if it should, the crisis of the 
contest would then be presented. It came, and, as was 
anticipated, it was followed by dark and doubtful days. 
Eleven months having pow passed, we are permitted to 
take another review. The rebel borders are pressed 
still further back, and, by the complete opening of the 
Mississippi, the country dominated by the rebellion is 
divided into distinct parts, with no practical communica- 
tion between them. Tennessee and Arkansas have been 
substantially cleared of insurgent control, and influential 
citizens in each, owners of slaves and advocates of slav- 
ery at the beginning of the rebellion, now declare openly 
for emancipation in their respective states. Of those 
states not included in the Emancipation Proclamation, 
Maryland and Missouri, neither of which three years 
ago would tolerate any restraint upon the extension of 
slavery into new territories, only dispute now as to 
the best mode of removing it within their own 
limits. 

Of those who were slaves at the beginning of the 
rebellion, full one hundred thousand are now in the 
United States military service, about one-half of which 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 339 

number actually bear arms in the ranks; thus giving 
the double advantage of taking so much labor from the 
insurgent cause, and supplying the places which other- 
wise must be filled with so many white men. So far as 
tested, it is difficult to say they are not as good soldiers 
as any. No servile insurrection, or tendency to violence 
or cruelty has marked the measures of emancipation and 
arming the blacks. These measures have been much 
discussed in foreign countries, and contemporary with 
such discussion the tone of public sentiment there is 
much improved. At home the same measures have been 
fully discussed, supported, criticized, and denounced, 
and the annual elections following are highly encourag- 
ing to those whose official duty it is to bear the country 
through this great trial. Thus we have the new reckon- 
ing. The crisis which threatened to divide the friends 
of the Union is past. 

Looking now to the present and future, and with ref- 
erence to a resumption of the national authority within 
the states wherein that authority has been suspended, I 
have thought fit to issue a proclamation, a copy of which 
is herewith transmitted. On examination of this proc- 
lamation it will appear, as is believed, that nothing is 
attempted beyond what is amply justified by the Con- 
stitution. True, the form of an oath is given, but no 
man is coerced to take it. The man is only promised a 
pardon in case he voluntarily takes the oath. The Con- 
stitution authorizes the Executive to grant or withhold 
the pardon at his own absolute discretion; and this 
includes the power to grant on terms, as is fully estab- 
lished by judicial and other authorities. 

It is also proffered that if, in any of the states named, 
a state government shall be, in the mode prescribed, set 
up, such government shall be recognized and guaranteed 
by the United States, and that under it the state shall, 
on the constitutional conditions, be protected against 
invasion and domestic violence. The constitutional obli- 



390 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

gation of the United States to guarantee to every state 
in the Union a republican form of government, and to 
protect the state in the cases stated, is explicit and full. 
But why tender the benefits of this provision only to a 
state government set up in this particular way? This 
section of the Constitution contemplates a case wherein 
the element within a state favorable to republican gov- 
ernment in the Union may be too feeble for an opposite 
and hostile element external to, or even within, the state ; 
and such are precisely the cases with which we are now 
dealing. 

An attempt to guarantee and protect a revived state 
government, constructed in whole, or in preponderating 
part, from the very element against whose hostility and 
violence it is to be protected, is simply absurd. There 
must be a test by which to separate the opposing ele- 
ments, so as to build only from the sound; and that test 
is a sufficiently liberal one which accepts as sound who- 
ever will make a sworn recantation of his former un- 
soundness. 

But if it be proper to require, as a test of admission 
to the political body, an oath of allegiance to the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and to the Union under 
it, why also to the laws and proclamations in regard to 
slavery? Those laws and proclamations were enacted 
and put forth for the purpose of aiding in the suppres- 
sion of the rebellion. To give them their fullest effect, 
there had to be a pledge for their maintenance. In my 
judgment they have aided, and will further aid, the 
cause for which they were intended. To now abandon 
them would be not only to relinquish a lever of power, 
but would also be a cruel and an astounding breach of 
faith. I may add, at this point, that while I remain in 
my present position I shall not attempt to retract or 
modify the Emancipation Proclamation; nor shall I 
return to slavery any person who is free by the terms of 
that proclamation, or by any of the acts of Congress. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 391 

For these and other reasons it is thought best that sup- 
port of these measures shall be included in the oath; 
and it is believed the Executive may lawfully claim it 
in return for pardon and restoration of forfeited rights, 
which he has clear constitutional power to withhold alto- 
gether, or grant upon the terms which he shall deem 
wisest for the public interest. It should be observed, 
also, that this part of the oath is subject to the modify- 
ing and abrogating power of legislation and supreme 
judicial decision. 

The proposed acquiescence of the national Executive 
in any reasonable temporary state arrangement for the 
freed people is made with the view of possibly modify- 
ing the confusion and destitution which must at best 
attend all classes by a total revolution of labor through- 
out whole states. It is hoped that the already deeply 
afflicted people in those states may be somewhat more 
ready to give up the cause of their affliction, if, to this 
extent, this vital matter be left to themselves ; while no 
power of the national Executive to prevent an abuse is 
abridged by the proposition. 

The suggestion in the proclamation as to maintaining 
the political framework of the states on what is called 
reconstruction is made in the hope that it may do good 
without danger of harm. It will save labor, and avoid 
great confusion. 

But why any proclamation now upon this subject? 
This question is beset with the conflicting views that the 
step might be delaj'^ed too long or be taken too soon. 
In some states the elements for resumption seem ready 
for action, but remain inactive apparently for want of a 
rallying point — a plan of action. Why shall A adopt 
the plan of B, rather than B that of A? And if A and 
B should agree, how can they know but that the general 
government here will reject their plan? By the procla- 
mation a plan is presented v^^hich may be accepted by 
them as a rallying point, and which they are assured in 



392 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

advance will not be rejected here. This may bring 
them to act sooner than they otherwise would. 

The objection to a premature presentation of a plan 
by the national Executive consists in the danger of com- 
mittals on points which could be more safely left to fur- 
ther developments. Care has been taken to so shape the 
document as to avoid embarrassments from this source. 
Saying that^ on certain terms, certain classes will be 
pardoned, with rights restored, it is not said that other 
classes, or other terms, will never be included. Saying 
that reconstruction will be accepted if presented in a 
specified wa}^, it is not said it will never be accepted in 
any other way. 

The movements, by state action, for emancipation in 
several of the states not included in the Emancipation 
Proclamation, are matters of profound gratulation. And 
while I do not repeat in detail what I have heretofore 
so earnestly urged upon this subject, my general views 
and feelings remain unchanged; and I trust that Con- 
gress will omit no fair opportunity of aiding these 
important steps to a great consummation. 

In the midst of other cares, however important, we 
must not lose sight of the fact that the war power is 
still our main reliance. To that power alone can we 
look, yet for a time, to give confidence to the people in 
the contested regions that the insurgent power will not 
again overrun them. Until that confidence shall be 
established, little can be done anywhere for what is 
called reconstruction. Hence our chiefest care must 
still be directed to the army and navy, who have thus far 
borne their harder part so nobly and well. And it may 
be esteemed fortunate that in giving the greatest effi- 
ciency to these indispensable arms, we do also honorably 
recognize the gallant men, from commander to sentinel, 
who compose them, and to whom, more than to others, 
the world must stand indebted for the home of freedom 
disenthralled, regenerated, enlarged, and perpetuated. 

Abraham Lincoln 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 393 

In February, 1864, it became necessary to call for a new 
draft.* Lincoln issued the call, which was very unpopular. 
The feeling in Chicago was particularly intense. The city had 
already furnished a large number of troops and there was a 
general desire to secure some modification of the order. A group 
of prominent citizens went to Washington to attempt to bring 
it about. Lincoln heard the War Department and the Chicago 
delegation present the opposing sides of the question, and at 
the close burst out with darkened face and angry voice: 

"Gentlemen, after Boston, Chicago has been the chief instru- 
ment in bringing this war on the country. The Northwest has 
opposed the South as New England has opposed the South. 
It is you who are largely responsible for making blood flow as 
it has. You called for war until we had it. You called for 
emancipation, and I have given it to you. Whatever you have 
asked for you have had. Now you come here begging to be 
let off from the call for men which I have made to carry out 
the war you have demanded. You ought to be ashamed of 
yourselves. I have a right to expect better things of you. Go 
home and raise your 6000 extra men." 

With the opening of the year 1864, the question of the presi- 
dential election became an important one. Secretary Chase 
never recovered from his belief that he, and not Lincoln, should 
have been nominated for President in 1860, As time passed, he 
became very anxious to receive the nomination in 1864. The 
Republican platform of 1860 had committed the party to a 
single presidential term, and in the fall of 1863 most of the 
party leaders failed to agree with Lincoln that it was "unsafe 
to swap horses while crossing a stream." He had against him 
the bitter hostility of the radical wing of the party and also a 
large part of the conservative leaders, who doubted his ability 
and were quietly seeking an abler man. 

Chase was doing all he could to win the radical group and 
finally "consented" that his name should be submitted to the 
party. In February, 1864, Senator Pomeroy of Kansas sent 
out a "confidential" circular, calling for organization in behalf 
of Chase's candidacy. Lincoln was aware of every step taken, 
but of course did not mention the movement to Chase. W^hen 
the Pomeroy circular appeared, Chase wrote him that he had 

*4s the war progressed, volunteering ceased, and it became 
necessary to draft or conscript men for the army. 



394 SELECTIONS FKOM LINCOLN . 

known nothing of it until he saw it in the newspapers, but 
admitted that he had consented to the use of his name, and 
added that, if Lincoln felt this would interfere with his use- 
fulness as Secretary of the Treasury, he would resign. Lin- 
coln thus replied: 

TO SALMON P. CHASE 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, February 23, 18b4 
Hon. Secretary of the Treasury. 

My dear Sir: Yours of yesterday in relation to the 
paper issued by Senator Pomeroy was duly received; 
and I write this note merely to say I will answer a little 
more fully when I can find time to do so. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

TO SALMON P. CHASE 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, February 29, 1864 
Hon. Secretary of the Treasury. 

My dear Sir: I would have taken time to answer 
yours of the 2d sooner, only that I did not suppose any 
evil could result from the delay, especially as, by a note, 
I promptly acknowledged the receipt of yours, and 
promised a fuller answer. Now, on consideration, I 
find there is really very little to say. My knowledge 
of Mr. Pomeroy's letter having been made public came 
to me only the day you wrote, but I had, in spite of 
myself, known of its existence several days before. I 
have not yet read it, and I think I shall not. I was not 
shocked or surprised by the appearance of the letter, 
because I had had knowledge of Mr. Pomeroy's com- 
mittee, and of secret issues which I supposed came from 
it, and of secret agents who I supposed were sent out by 
it, for several weeks. I have known just as little of 
these things as my friends have allowed me to know. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 395 

The}'' bring the documents to me^ but I do not read 
them; they tell me what they think fit to tell me, but I 
do not inquire for more. I fully concur with you that 
neither of us can be justly held responsible for what 
our respective friends may do without our instigation or 
countenance; and I assure you, as you have assured me, 
that no assault has been made upon you by my instiga- 
tion or with my countenance. Whether you shall remain 
at the head of the Treasury Department is a question 
which I will not allow myself to consider from any 
standpoint other than my judgment of the public serv- 
ice, and, in that view, I do not perceive occasion for a 
change. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

A few days later the "Republican members of the Ohio 
legislature declared for Lincoln's renomination and, with his 
own state against him, there was nothing for Chase to do but 
to withdraw. Later in the year he resigned, as he had done 
several times before, and, to his surprise, Lincoln accepted the 
resignation. When Chief Justice Taney died in the autumn, 
Lincoln, after long consideration, appointed Chase to succeed 
him. 

In March, 1864, reconstruction under Lincoln's plan had 
proceeded far enough in Louisiana for the election of a gov- 
ernor. He was inaugurated on March 4, and Lincoln wrote 
this letter of congratulation, which is chiefly interesting for its 
suggestion of limited negro suffrage, intended, without doubt,, 
to forestall radical opposition, 

TO MICHAEL HAHN 

[Private] 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, March 13, 1864. 
Hon. Michael Hahn. 

My dear Sir: I congratulate you on having fixed 
your name in history as the first free state governor of 
Louisiana. Now you are about to have a convention, 



396 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

which among other things, will probably define the elec- 
tive franchise. I barely suggest for your private con- 
sideration, whether some of the colored people may not 
be let in — as, for instance, the very intelligent, and espe- 
cially those who have fought gallantly in our ranks. 
They would probably help, in some trying time to come, 
to keep the jewel of liberty within the family of 
freedom. But this is only a suggestion, not to the public, 
but to you alone.* 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In March, Governor Thomas E. Bramlette of Kentucky- 
was in Washington to confer about the execution of the draft 
in his state and to protest against the enrollment of negro 
soldiers. With Colonel Albert Gallatin Hodges, a prominent 
Kentucky editor, and former Senator Archibald Dixon, he 
called upon the President. The following letter resulted from 
that interview. It will be noted that in the concluding para- 
graph appears a foreshadowing of his second inaugural. 

TO A. G. HODGES 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, April 4, 1864 
A. G. Hodges, Esq., 

Frankfort, Kentucky 
My dear Sir: You ask me to put in writing the sub- 
stance of what I verbally said the other day in your 
presence, to Governor Bramlette and Senator Dixon. 
It was about as follows : 

"I am naturally anti-slavery. If slavery is not wrong, 

nothing is wrong. I cannot remember when I did not 

so think and feel, and yet I have never understood that 

the presidency conferred upon me an unrestricted right 

to act officially upon this judgment and feeling. It was 

in the oath I took that I would, to the best of my ability, 

• Negro suffrage was not granted by the constitution adopted, 
but the legislature was empowered to grant it. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 397 

preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the 
United States. I could not take the office without 
taking the oath. Nor was it my view that I might take 
an oath to get power, and break the oath in using the 
power. I understood, too, that in ordinary civil admin- 
istration this oath even forbade me to practically indulge 
my primary abstract judgment on the moral question of 
slavery. I had publicly declared this many times, and 
in many ways. And I aver that, to this day, I have 
done no official act in mere deference to my abstract 
judgment and feeling on slavery. I did understand, 
however, that my oath to preserve the Constitution to 
the best of my ability imposed upon me the duty of 
preserving, by every indispensable means, that govern- 
ment — that nation, of which that Constitution was the 
organic law. Was it possible to lose the nation and yet 
preserve the Constitution? By general law, life and 
limb must be protected, yet often a limb must be ampu- 
tated to save a life; but a life is never wisely given to 
save a limb. I felt that measures otherwise unconsti- 
tutional might become lawful by becoming indispensable 
to the preservation of the Constitution through the 
preservation of the nation. Right or wrong, I assumed 
this ground, and now avow it. I could not feel that, 
to the best of my ability, I had even tried to preserve the 
Constitution, if, to save slavery or any minor matter, I 
should permit the wreck of government, country, and 
Constitution all together. When, early in the war, Gen- 
eral Fremont attempted military emancipation, I for- 
bade it, because I did not then think it an indispensable 
necessity. When, a little later, General Cameron, then 
Secretary of War, suggested the arming of the blacks, I 
objected because I did not yet think it an indispensable 
necessity. When still later. General Hunter attempted 
military emancipation, I again forbade it, because I did 
not yet think the indispensable necessity had come. 
When in March and May and July, 1862, I made earn- 



398 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

est and successive appeals to the border states to favor 
compensated emancipation, I believed the indispensable 
necessity for military emancipation and arming the 
blacks would come, unless averted by that measure. 
They declined the proposition, and I was, in my best 
judgment, driven to the alternative of either surrender- 
ing the Union, and with it the Constitution, or of laying 
strong hand upon the colored element. 1 chose the 
latter. In choosing it, I hoped for greater gain than 
loss; but of this, I was not entirely confident. More 
than a year of trial now shows no loss by it in our for- 
eign relations, none in our home popular sentiment, none 
in our white military force — no loss by it anyhow or 
anywhere. On the contrary it shows a gain of quite a 
hundred and thirty thousand soldiers, seamen, and 
laborers. These are palpable facts, about which, as 
facts, there can be no caviling. We have the men; and 
we could not have had them without the measure. 

"And now let any Union man who complains of the 
measure test himself by writing down in one line that 
he is for subduing the rebellion by force of arms; and 
in the next, that he is for taking these hundred and 
thirty thousand men from the Union side, and placing 
them where they would be but for the measure he con- 
demns. If he cannot face his case so stated, it is only 
because he cannot face the truth." 

I add a word which was not in the verbal conversa- 
tion. In telling this tale I attempt no compliment to 
my own sagacity. I claim not to have controlled events, 
but confess plainly that events have controlled me. 
Now, at the end of three years' struggle, the nation's 
condition is not what either party, or any man, devised 
or expected. God alone can claim it. Whither it is 
tending seems plain. If God now wills the removal of 
a great wrong, and wills also that we of the North, as 
well as you of the South, shall pay fairly for our com- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 399 

plicity in that wrong, impartial history will find therein 
new cause to attest and revere the justice and goodness 
of God. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

In February, General Grant was made a lieutenant general 
and was called to Washington to receive his commission. 
While there he was placed in command of the armies of the 
United States. Lincoln met him for the first time and urged 
upon him the capture of Richmond as a thing of supreme 
importance, promising him, at the same time, full support. 
Grant imj^ressed Lincoln with great confidence, which is reflected 
in this letter: 



TO GENERAL U. 8. GRANT 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, April 30, 1864 
Lieutenant General Grant: Not expecting to see 
you again before the spring campaign opens, I wish to 
express in this way my entire satisfaction with what you 
have done up to this time, so far as I understand it. 
The particulars of your plans I neither know nor seek 
to know. You are vigilant and self-reliant; and, pleased 
with this, I wish not to obtrude any constraints or 
restraints upon you. While I am very anxious that any 
great disaster or capture of our men in great numbers 
shall be avoided, I know these points are less likely to 
escape your attention than they would be mine. If 
there is anything wanting which is within my power to 
give, do not fail to let me know it. And now, with a 
brave army and a just cause, may God sustain you. 
Yours very truly, 

A. Lincoln 

Beginning with the suspension of the privilege of the writ 
of habeas cor^ms by the President in 1861, there was constant 



400 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

and steadily growing interference by the military authorities, 
acting under the war power of the President, with the freedom 
of individuals. "Not only in Maryland, and the regions near 
the seat of war, but in the most distant parts of the land, from 
Maine to California, men were seized without any information 
as to the charges against them, and were confined in forts and 
prison camps."* During 1863 this military dictatorship, in 
which "all the powers of government were virtually concen- 
trated in a single department, and that the department whose 
energies were directed by the will of a single man,"t became 
more stringent than ever. Arbitrary arrests were increasingly 
frequent, the trial of citizens not in the military service of the 
country by military commissions, a form of court unknown to 
the Constitution and the laws of the United States, ceased to 
be any novelty, and newspapers were compelled to suspend, pub- 
lication because their opinions did not coincide with those of 
military officers. Civil liberty as guaranteed under the Consti- 
tution no longer existed, for freedom of speech, of the press, 
and of the person had disappeared. Lincoln had sunk every 
other consideration in the winning of the war, and was justified 
in his policy by his legal advisers, who held that as commander- 
in-chief of the army, exercising the war power, he was prac- 
tically unhampered by any legal restrictions. 

These things were bitterly unpopular at the time, but with 
the final success of the Union cause it became usual to condemn 
those who opposed the interference with constitutional rights 
by the military power as unpatriotic. A sounder and saner 
view is that of Carl Schurz, who said: 

"Nobody should be blamed who, when such things are done, 
in good faith and from patriotic motives, protests against them. 
In a republic, arbitrary stretches of power, even when de- 
manded by necessity, should never be permitted to pass with- 
out a protest on the one hand and an apology on the other. 
It is well they did not so pass during our civil war. 

"That arbitrary measures were resorted to, is true. . . . 
No American President ever wielded such power as that which 
was thrust into Lincoln's hands. It is to be hoped that no 
American President ever will have to be intrusted with such 
power again." 

♦Dunningr, Essays on Civil War and Reconstruction, page 
tibid., page 21. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 40I 

One of the most remarkable examples of the operations of 
the military dictatorship* occurred in May, 186'4. A new call 
for a draft was generally expected, and everyone knew that it 
would cause stocks to fall, and result in business and fmancial 
depression. Certain stock speculators managed to imitate 
very cleverly the press telegrams from Washington with a 
forged proclamation from the President calling for troops. It 
came very late and the World and Journal of Commerce, not 
doubting its authenticity, published it. The Tribune would 
have done so had not its edition already gone to press. The 
incident called forth the action described in this proclamation: 

TO GENERAJU JOHN A. DIX 

Executive Mansion, 

Washington, D. C, May 18, 1864 

]\L\JOR General Dix, Commanding at New York: 
Whereas there has been wickedly and traitorously printed 
and published this morning in the New York World and 
New York Journal of Commerce, newspapers printed 
and published in the city of New York, a false and 
spurious proclamation, purporting to be signed by the 
President and to be countersigned by the Secretary of 
State, which publication is of a treasonable nature 
designed to give aid and comfort to the enemies of the 
United States and to the rebels now at war against the 
government, and their aiders and abetters; you are 
therefore hereby commanded forthwith to arrest and 
imprison, in any fort or military prison in your com- 
mand, the editors, proprietors, and publishers of the 
aforesaid newspapers, and all such persons as, after 
public notice has been given of the falsehood of said 
publication, print and publish the same with intent to 
give aid and comfort to the enemy; and you wnll hold 
the persons so arrested in close custody until they can 
be brought to trial before a military commission for 
their oflfense. You will also take possession by military 
force, of the printing establishments of the New York 

*See footnote, page 284. 



402 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

World and Journal of Commerce, and hold the same 
until further orders, and prevent any further publica- 
tion therefrom. 

A. Lincoln 
President of the United States 
By the President: 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State 

When the presidential campaign of 1864 came, Lincoln was 
renominated by the National Union Convention, which met in 
Baltimore. Through his influence, Andrew Johnson of Ten- 
nessee was nominated for Vice President. This choice was 
dictated by a desire to show the outside world, by the selection 
of a Southerner, that the seceded states were still a part of 
the Union, and a desire to express to the country, by the 
nomination of a Democrat, the reality of the name Union party, 
which the Republicans assumed in this campaign. It is not at 
all improbable that a third reason influenced Lincoln. The 
problem of the reconstruction of the seceded states was in his 
opinion of first magnitude. It is more than probable that 
Johnson's known agreement with his own views, and his con- 
nection as military governor with his plan, may have been a 
leading cause of the decision. 

The radical elements, still dissatisfied with Lincoln, had 
acted before the Baltimore convention. At a mass convention 
held in Cleveland they nominated John C. Fremont for Presi- 
dent. The convention was a farce and, instead of the thou- 
sands expected, only four hundred were in attendance. When 
this was mentioned to Lincoln, he reached for the Bible which 
was always on his desk, and read this verse from the second 
chapter olF the First Book of Samuel: "And everj'^one that was 
in distress, and everyone that was in debt, and everyone that 
was discontented gathered themselves unto him; and he be- 
came a captain over them; and there were with him about four 
hundred men." 

The Democrats nominated General George B. McClellan on 
a platform which declared, 

"Resolved, That this convention does explicitly declare, as 
the sense of the American people, that after four years of 
failure to restore the Union by the experiment of war, during 
which under the pretense of a military necessity, or war power 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 403 

higher than the Constitution, the Constitution itself has been 
disregarded in every part, and public liberty and private right 
alike trodden down and the material prosperity of the country 
essentially impaired, justice, humanity, liberty, and the public 
welfare demand that immediate efforts be made for a cessation 
of hostilities, with a view to an ultimate convention of states, 
or other peaceable means, to the end that at the earliest prac- 
ticable moment peace may be restored on the basis of the 
Federal Union of the states." 

At the beginning of the campaign all the signs pointed to 
Lincoln's defeat. A serious Republican revolt was in progress 
which might mean a further split in the party. He himself 
thought that defeat could not be avoided, and a week before 
the Democratic convention, he wrote this memorandum which 
he showed folded up to his cabinet, getting all the members 
to sign it on the back and not mentioning its contents. After 
the election, he showed it to them, saying, "At least, I should 
have done my duty and have stood clear before my own 
conscience." 

MEMORANDUM 
[August 23, 1864] 

This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceed- 
ingly probable that this administration will not be 
reelected. Then it will be my duty to so cooperate with 
the President-elect as to save the Union between the 
election and the inauguration ; as he will have secured 
his election on such ground that he cannot possibly save 
it afterward. 

A. Lincoln 

Fremont withdrew in September and, the military successes 
of the autumn giving the administration renewed strength, 
Lincoln was reelected by a large majority. 

The losses in human life of the war were terrific, and 
Lincoln's tender heart was wrung by the suffering of those 
bereaved. His tenderness and kindness of heart were more apt 
to bt displayed in action than in words, but a few of his 
letters are full of these qualities, and the one which follows 



404 SELECTIONS FROM EIN'COLN 

abounds in them. It is further, in its loftiness of spirit, its 
severe self-restraint, and its simplicity of style, one of the most 
perfect of letters of condolence. 

TO 21 RS. BIXBY 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, November 21, 186i 
Mrs. Bixby, Boston, Mass. 

Dear Madam: I have been shown in the files of the 
War Department a statement of the Adjutant-General 
of Massachusetts that 3^ou are the mother of five sons 
who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel 
how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine 
which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a 
loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from ten- 
dering to you the consolation that maj^ be found in the 
thanks of the republic they died to save. I pray that 
our Heaventy Father may assuage the anguish of your 
bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory 
of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be 
yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of 
freedom. 

Yours very sincerely and respectfully, 

Abraham Lincoln 

By 1864, Lincoln was convinced that the time had come for 
the abolition of slavery by an amendment to the Constitution. 
In his annual message he discusses this point and also the 
progress of his plan of reconstruction in Louisiana, Arkansas, 
and Tennessee. 

EXTRACT FROM ANNUAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS 
[December 6, 18641 

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Rep- 
resentatives: Again the blessings of health and abun- 
dant harvests claim our profoundest gratitude to 
Almighty God. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 493 

The war continues. Since the last annual message, 
all the important lines and positions then occupied by 
our forces have been maintained, and our arms have 
steadily advanced, thus liberating the regions left in the 
rear; so that Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, and parts 
of other states have again produced reasonably fair 
crops. 

The most remarkable feature in the military opera- 
tions of the year is General Sherman's attempted march 
of tliree hundred miles, directly through the insurgent 
region. It tends to show a great increase in our rela- 
tive strength, that our general-in-chief should feel able 
to confront and hold in check every active force of the 
enemy, and yet to detach a well-appointed large army 
to move on such an expedition. The result not being 
yet known, conjecture in regard to it is not here 
indulged. 

Important movements have also occurred during the 
year to the effect of molding society for durability in 
the Union. Although short of complete success, it is 
much in the right direction that 12,000 citizens in each 
of the states of Arkansas and Louisiana have organized 
loyal state governments, with free constitutions, and are 
earnestly struggling to maintain and administer them. 
The movements in the same direction^ more extensive 
though less definite, in Missouri, Kentucky, and Ten- 
nessee, should not be overlooked. But Maryland pre- 
sents the example of complete success. Maryland is 
secure to liberty and Union for all the future. The 
genius of rebellion will no more claim Maryland. Like 
another foul spirit, being driven out, it may seek to 
tear her, but it will woo her no more.* 

At the last session of Congress a proposed amendment 
to the Constitution, abolishing slavery throughout the 
United States, passed the Senate, but failed for lack of 
the requisite two-thirds vote in the House cf Represen- 

♦Mark ix. 17-26. 



406 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

tatives. Although the present is the same Congress, and 
nearly the same members, and without questioning the 
wisdom or patriotism of those who stood in opposition, 
I venture to recommend the reconsideration and passage 
of the measure at the present session. Of course the 
abstract question is not changed, but an intervening 
election shows, almost certainly, that the next Congress 
will pass the measure if this does not. Hence there is 
only a question of time as to when the proposed amend- 
ment will go to the states for their action. And as it 
is to so go, at all events, may we not agree that the 
sooner the better? It is not claimed that the election 
has imposed a duty on members to change their views 
or their votes any further than as an additional element 
to be considered, their judgment may be affected by it. 
It is the voice of the people now for the first time heard 
upon the question. In a great national crisis like ours, 
unanimity of action among those seeking a common end 
is very desirable — almost indispensable. And yet no 
approach to such unanimity is attainable unless some 
deference shall be paid to the will of the majority, 
simply because it is the will of the majority. In this 
case the common end is the maintenance of the Union, 
and among the means to secure that end, such will, 
through the election, is most clearly declared in favor 
of such constitutional amendment. 

The most reliable indication of public purpose in 
this country is derived through our popular elections. 
Judging by the recent canvass and its result, the pur- 
pose of the people within the loyal states to maintain 
the integrity of the Union, was never more firm nor more 
nearly unanimous than now. The extraordinary calm- 
ness and good order with which the millions of voters 
met and mingled at the polls give strong assurance of 
this. Not only all those who supported the Union 
ticket, so called, but a great majority of the opposing 
party also, may be fairly claimed to entertain, and to be 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 407 

actuated by, the same purpose. It is an unanswerable 
argument to this effect, that no candidate for any office 
whatever, high or low, has ventured to seek votes on the 
avowal that he was for giving up the Union. There has 
been much impugning of motives, and much heated con- 
troversy as to the proper means and best mode of 
advancing the Union cause; but on the distinct issue of 
Union or no Union the politicians have shown their 
instinctive knowledge that there is no diversity among 
the people. In affording the people the fair opportun- 
ity of showing one to another and to the world this firm- 
ness and unanimity of purpose, the election has been of 
vast value to the national cause. 

The election has exhibited another fact, not less valu- 
able to be known — the fact that we do not approach 
exhaustion in the most important branch of national 
resources — that of living men. While it is melancholy 
to reflect that the war has filled so many graves, and 
carried mourning to so many hearts, it is some relief to 
know that compared with the surviving, the fallen have 
been so few. While corps, and divisions, and brigades, 
and regiments have formed, and fought, and dwindled, 
and gone out of existence, a great majority of the men 
who composed them are still living. The same is true 
of the naval service. The election returns prove this. 
So many voters could not else be found. The states 
regularly holding elections, both now and four years 
ago — to wit: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illi- 
nois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Mas- 
sachusetts, Michigan, IMinnesota, Missouri, New Hamp- 
shire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsyl- 
vania, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wis- 
consin — cast 3,982,011 votes now, against 3,870,222 cast 
then; showing an aggregate now of 3,982,011. To 
this is to be added 33,762 cast now in the new states of 
Kansas and Nevada, which states did not vote in 1860; 
thus swelling the aggregate to 4,015,773, and the net 



408 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

increase during the three years and a half of war, to 
1^5^551. A table is appended^ showing particulars. To 
this again should be added the number of all soldiers in 
the field from Massachusetts^ Rhode Island, New Jer- 
sey, Delaware, Indiana, Illinois, and California, who by 
the laws of those states could not vote away from their 
homes, and which number cannot be less than 90,000. 
Nor yet is this all. The number in organized terri- 
tories is triple now what it was four years ago, while 
thousands, white and black, join us as the national arms 
press back the insurgent lines. So much is shown, 
affirmatively and negatively, by the election. 

It is not material to inquire how the increase has been 
produced, or to show that it would have been greater 
but for the war, which is probably true. The important 
fact remains demonstrated that we have more men now 
than we had when the war began; that we are not 
exhausted, nor in process of exhaustion; that we are 
gaining strength, and may, if need be, maintain the 
contest indefinitely. This as to men. Material re- 
sources are now more complete and abundant than ever. 
The national resources, then, are unexhausted, and, as 
we believe, inexhaustible. The public purpose to re- 
establish and maintain the national authority is un- 
changed, and, as we believe unchangeable. The manner 
of continuing the effort remains to choose. On careful 
consideration of all the evidence accessible, it seems to 
me that no attempt at negotiation with the insurgent 
leader could result in any good. He would accept noth- 
ing short of severance of the Union — precisely what we 
will not and cannot give. His declarations to this effect 
are explicit and oft repeated. He does not attempt to 
deceive us. He affords us no excuse to deceive ourselves. 
He cannot voluntarily reaccept the Union; we cannot 
voluntarily yield it. 

Between him and us the issue is distinct, simple, and 
inflexible. It is an issue which can onlv be tried by war. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 409 

and decided by victory. If we yields we are beaten; if 
the Southern people fail him, he is beaten. Either way 
it would be the victory and defeat following war. What 
is true, however, of him who heads the insurgent cause, 
is not necessarily true of those who follow. Although 
he cannot reaccept the Union, they can. Some of them, 
we know, already desire peace and reunion. The number 
of such may increase. 

They can at any moment have peace simply by laying 
down their arms and submitting to the national authority 
under the Constitution. After so much the government 
could not, if it would, maintain war against them. The 
loyal people would not sustain or allow it. If questions 
should remain, we would adjust them by the peaceful 
means of legislation, conference, courts, and votes, 
operating only in constitutional and lawful channels. 
Some certain, and other possible, questions are, and 
would be, beyond the executive power to adjust; as, for 
instance, the admission of members into Congress, and 
whatever might require the appropriation of money. 
The executive power itself would be greatly diminished 
by the cessation of actual war. Pardons and remissions 
of forfeitures, however, would still be within executive 
control. In what spirit and temper this control would 
be exercised, can be fairly judged of by the past. 

A year ago general pardon and amnesty, upon speci- 
fied terms, were offered to all except certain designated 
classes, and it was at the same time made known that 
the excepted classes were still within contemplation of 
special clemency. During the year many availed them- 
selves of the general provision, and many more would, 
only that the signs of bad faith in some led to such 
precautionary measures as rendered the practical process 
less easy and certain. During the same time, also, 
special pardons have been granted to individuals of the 
excepted classes, and no voluntarj^ application has been 
denied. 



410 SELECTIONS FEOM LINCOLN 

Thus, practically ;, the door lias been for a full year 
open to all, except such as were not in condition to make 
free choice — that is, such as were in custody or under 
constraint. It is still so open to all; but the time may 
come — probably will come — when public duty shall de- 
mand that it be closed; and that in lieu more rigorous 
measures than heretofore shall be adopted. 

In presenting the abandonment of armed resistance 
to the national authority on the part of the insurgents 
as the only indispensable condition to ending the war 
on the part of the government, I retract nothing hereto- 
fore said as to slaver3^ I repeat the declaration made 
a year ago, that "while I remain in my present position 
I shall not attempt to retract or modify the Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation, nor shall I return to slavery any 
person who is free by the terms of that proclamation, 
or by any of the acts of Congress." 

If the people should, by whatever mode or means, 
make it an executive duty to reenslave such persons, 
another, and not I, must be their instrument to per- 
form it. 

In stating a single condition of peace, I mean simply 
to say that the war will cease on the part of the govern- 
ment whenever it shall have ceased on the part of those 
who began it. 

Abraham Lincoln 



When on March 4, 1865, Lincoln delivered his second in- 
augniral address, the end of the war was in sight. The marks 
of the four years in the all-consuming furnace of war had been 
stamped upon his face as upon his soul as revealed in the 
speech he was about to make. Through all these years he had 
been growing in patience and in hopefulness; in justice and 
in understanding; in tenderness and in mercy; in capacity and 
in strength. With his growth in greatness he had grown in 
modesty. For whatever he may have been in 1861, now, after 
the fiery furnace through which he had passed, he was su- 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 411 

premely great, though not as yet had his people come to see 
it. But with it all he was bowed with the griefs of his people, 
and his face showed the truth of his words at the time, "I 
think I shall never be glad again." As Lord Charnwood says: 
"This man had stood alone in the dark. He had done justice; 
he had loved mercy; he had walked humbly with his God." 

The second inaugural ranks with the Gettysburg address in 
its simple yet wonderfully felicitous language and style, its 
deep feeling, and its "high seriousness." It was not generally 
so regarded at the time, judging by the comment of the news- 
papers. Like his other addresses, it was to come into its own 
after a time. One of the most striking commentaries upon 
it is that of the London Spectator at a much later day, 

"In three or four hundred words that burn with the heat of 
their compression he tells the history of the war and reads its 
lesson. No nobler thoughts were ever conceived. No man 
ever found words more adequate to his desire. Here is the 
whole tale of the nation's shame and the misery of her heroic 
struggles to free herself therefrom and of her victory. Had 
Lincoln written a hundred times as much more, he would not 
have said more fully what he desired to -say. Every thought 
receives its complete expression, and there is no word employed 
which does not directly and manifestly contribute to the de- 
velopment of the central thought. 

"We cannot read it without a renewed conviction that it is 
the noblest political document known to history, and should 
have for the nation and the statesmen he left behind him some- 
thing of a sacred and almost prophetic character." 

SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS 
[March 4, 1865] 

Fellow Countrymen: At this second appearing to 
take the oath of the presidential office, there is less 
occasion for an extended address than there was at the 
first. Then a statement, somewhat in detail, of a course 
to be pursued, seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the 
expiration of four years, during which public declara- 
tions have been constantly called forth on every point 
and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the 



412 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little 
that is new could be presented. The progress of our 
arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well 
known to the public as to myself ; and it is, I trust, 
reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With 
high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it 
is ventured. 

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago, 
all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending 
civil war. All dreaded it — all sought to avert it. While 
the inaugural address was being delivered from this 
place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without 
war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy 
it without war — seeking to dissolve the Union, and 
divide effects, by negotiation. Both parties deprecated 
war; but one of them would make war rather than let 
the nation survive; and the other would accept war 
rather than let it perish. And the war came. 

One-eighth of the whole population were colored 
slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but 
localized in the southern part of it. These slaves con- 
stituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that 
this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war. To 
strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the 
object for which the insurgents would rend the Union, 
even by war; while the government claimed no riglit to 
do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. 

Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or 
the duration which it has already attained. Neither 
anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease 
with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. 
Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less 
fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, 
and pray to the same God ; and each invokes His aid 
against the other. 

It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 413 

a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the 
sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not, that 
we be not judged.* The prayers of both could not be 
answered — that of neither has been answered fully. 

The Almighty has his own purposes. "Woe unto the 
world because of offenses ! for it must needs be that 
offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense 
Cometh." f If we shall suppose that American slavery 
is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, 
must needs come, but which, having continued through 
His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that 
He gives to both North and South this terrible war, as 
the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we 
discern therein any departure from those divine at- 
tributes which the believers in a living God always 
ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope — fervently do we 
pray — that this mighty scourge of war may speedily 
pass awav.| Yet, if God wills that it continue until 
all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and 
fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until 
every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid 
by another drawn with the sword, as was said three 
thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judg- 
ments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."** 

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with 
firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, 
let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up 
the nation's wounds ; to care for him who shall have 
borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan — to 
do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting 
peace among ourselves, and with all nations. 



• Matthew, vii, 1. 
t Matthew, xviii, 7. 

tThe unintentional rime has been frequently criticised. 
*♦ Psalms, xix, 9. 



414 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

Lincoln's own opinion of the address is expressed in a note 
to Thurlow Weed. 

TO THURLOW WEED 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, March 15, 1865 
Dear Mr. Weed: 

Every one likes a compliment. Thank you for yours 
on my little notification speech and on the recent in- 
augural address. I expect the latter to wear as well, as 
— perhaps better than — anything I have produced; but 
I believe it is not immediately popular. Men are not 
flattered by being shown that there has been a difference 
of purpose between the Almighty and them. To deny 
it, however, in this case, is to deny that there is a God 
governing the world. It is a truth which I thought 
needed to be told, and, as whatever of humiliation there 
is in it falls most directly on myself, I thought others 
might afford for me to tell it. 

Truly yours, 

A. Lincoln 

As has been seen, Lincoln had very definite views on the 
question of the reconstruction of the seceded states. These 
were rather generally accepted after his message of 1863, but, 
before the session of Congress ended, radical opposition, led 
by Henry Winter Davis of Maryland and Benjamin F. Wade 
of Ohio, had developed, resulting in the passage of a bill pre- 
scribing more severe terms of restoration, and ignoring the 
President in the process required. Lincoln vetoed it, and, 
so far as could be seen, he had the backing of the country, the 
convention of 1864 making no mention of the question, and the 
session of Congress which ended on March 4, 1865, also 
ignoring it. 

Lincoln was not only determined upon the acceptance of 
the Southern states as still in the Union; he was no less deter- 
mined that there should be, so far as such a thing was possible, 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 4I5 

a genuine reconciliation of the sections. He, almost alone of 
public men in the North, had refrained from harsh expressions 
toward the South. An illustration of his attitude is to be 
seen in a happening in one of the Washington military hospitals 
during the war. He started to go into a ward filled with 
prisoners, and the attendant said, "Mr. President! You won't 
want to go in there; they are only rebels." Lincoln laid his 
hand on the attendant's shoulder and said, "You mean Con- 
federates," and went on in. He allowed food to go to Savannah 
in 1865 when Stanton refused the ships clearance for the 
purpose and again and again indicated the sort of policy he 
had in mind concerning the Southern people. When someone 
in conversation said that Jefferson Davis ought to be hanged, 
he quoted, "Let us judge not, that we be not judged," and 
repeated, "Let us judge not, that we be not judged." R. M. T. 
Hunter, in company with Judge J. A. Campbell and Alex- 
ander H. Stephens, met Lincoln and Seward on February 3, 
1865, at the Hampton Roads Conference, where they discussed 
the possibility of peace. He felt clearly this attitude of 
Lincoln and said smilingly, "Well, Mr. Lincoln, we have about 
concluded that we shall not be hanged as long as you are 
President, if we behave ourselves." 

It was entirely true that he wanted no policy of retribution. 
He gave orders to facilitate the escape of Davis and his 
cabinet, and said, "No one need expect I will take any part in 
hanging or killing these men, even the worst of them. Frighten 
them out of the country, open the gates, let down the bars, 
scare them off. Enough lives have been sacrificed ; we must 
extinguish our resentments if we expect harmony and union." 
It was clear that he believed that the new order of things 
should be established without bitterness and without reproaches, 
and, as Hapgood says, by treating the Confederate as if he 
were a beloved brother who had just been convinced in an 
argument. 

After the fall of Richmond, Lincoln visited the city. There 
he met Judge John A. Campbell, who had been at the Hampton 
Roads Conference, and they discussed the restoration of order. 
Lincoln gave him the following unsigned memorandum on the 
subject of the terms of peace: 



416 SELECTIONS FROM LINXOLX 

MEMORANDUM ON TERMS OF PEACE 
[April 5, 1865] 

As to peace, I have said before, and now repeat, that 
three things are indispensable: 

1. The restoration of the national authority through- 
out the United States. 

2. No receding by the Executive of the United States 
on the slavery question from the position assumed 
thereon in the late annual message, and in preceding 
documents. 

S. No cessation of hostilities short of an end of the 
war, and the disbanding of all forces hostile to the 
government. That all propositions coming from those 
now in hostility to the government, not inconsistent with 
the foregoing, will be respectfully considered and passed 
upon in a spirit of sincere liberality. 

I now add that it seems useless for me to be more 
specific with those who will not say that they are ready 
for the indispensable terms, even on conditions to be 
named by themselves. If there be any who are ready 
for these indispensable terms, on any conditions what- 
ever, let them sa}^ so, and state their conditions, so that 
the conditions can be known and considered. It is 
further added, that the remission of confiscation being 
within the executive power, if the war be now further 
persisted in by those opposing the government, the 
making of confiscated property at the least to bear the 
additional cost will be insisted on, but that confiscations 
(except in case of third-party intervening interests) 
will be remitted to the people of any state whicli shall 
now promptly and in good faith withdraw its troops from 
further resistance to the government. What is now said 
as to the remission of confiscation has no reference to 
supposed property in slaves. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 417 

He then sent General Grant the following account of what 
he had done: 

TO GENERAL U. S. GRANT 
[Telegram] 

Headquarters, Armies of the United States, 

City Point, April 6, 1865, 12 m. 
Lieutenant General Grant, in the Field: 

Secretary Seward was thrown from his carriage yes- 
terday and seriously injured. This, with other matters, 
will take me to Washington soon. I was at Richmond 
yesterday and the day before, when and where Judge 
Campbell, who was with Messrs. Hunter and Stephens 
in February, called on me, and made such representa- 
tions as induced me to put in his hands an informal 
paper, repeating the propositions in my letter of in- 
structions to Mr. Seward, which you remember, and 
adding that if the w^ar be now further persisted in by 
the rebels, confiscated property shall at the least bear 
the additional cost, and that confiscation shall be re- 
mitted to the people of any state which will now 
promptly and in good faith withdraw its troops and 
other support from resistance to the government. 

Judge Campbell thought it not impossible that the 
rebel legislature of Virginia would do the latter if per- 
mitted ; and accordingly I addressed a private letter to 
General Weitzel with permission to Judge Campbell to 
see it, telling him (General Weitzel) that if they attempt 
this, to permit and protect them, unless they attempt 
something hostile to the United States, in which case 
to give them notice and time to leave, and to arrest any 
remaining after such time. 

I do not think it very probable that anything will 
come of this, but I have thought best to notify you, so 
that if you should see signs you may understand them. 



418 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

From your recent despatches it seems that you are 
pretty effectually withdrawing the Virginia troops from 
opposition to the government. Nothing that I have done, 
cr probably shall do, is to delay, hinder, or interfere 
with your work. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

A few days later when preparations were being made for 
the assembling of the Virginia legislature, so much hostile 
opposition appeared in the North that Lincoln retracted the 
offer, saying that the situation had been changed by Lee's sur- 
render, which had taken place at Appomattox on April 9. 

When the news reached Washington of Lee's surrender, a 
large crowd went to the White House and called for Lincoln. 
He asked them to come back the next night and promised that 
he would speak to them then. In the meantime he prepared 
with great care an address which proved to be his last public 
utterance. He read it from one of the windows of the White 
House to an immense crowd outside, by whom it was en- 
thusiastically received. It is notable for its dealing with the 
question of reconstruction, "the binding up of the nation's 
wounds." It was no easy task that lay before him, particularly 
in view of the bitter hatred of him and his policy on the part 
of the radical leaders in Congress. The following extract from 
George W. Julian's Recollections * will indicate the extent of 
this. Speaking of Lincoln's death he wrote: 

"I spent most of the afternoon in a political caucus, held 
for the purpose of considering the necessity for a new cabinet 
and a line of policy less conciliatory than that of Mr. Lincoln; 
and while everybody was shocked at his murder, the feeling: 
was nearly universal that the accession of Johnson to the 
Presidency would prove a godsend to the country." 

LAST PUBLIC ADDRESS 
[April 11, 1865] 

We meet this evening not in sorrow, but in gladness 

of heart. The evacuation of Petersburg and Richmond, 

and the surrender of the principal insurgent army give 

hope of a righteous and speedy peace, whose joyous 

♦Julian, PoUtica Recollections, page 255. 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 419 

expression cannot be restrained. In the midst of this, 
however^ He from whom all blessings flow must not be 
forgotten. A call for a national thanksgiving is being 
prepared, and will be duly promulgated. Nor must those 
whose harder part give us the cause of rejoicing be 
overlooked. Their honors must not be parceled out with 
others. I myself was near the front, and had the high 
pleasure of transmitting much of the good news to you; 
but no part of the honor for plan or execution is mine. 
To General Grant, his skillful officers and brave men, 
all belongs. The gallant navy stood ready, but was not 
in reach to take active part. By these recent successes 
the reinauguration of the national authority — recon- 
struction — which has had a large share of thought from 
the first, is pressed much more closely upon our atten- 
tion. It is fraught with great difficulty. Unlike a case 
of war between independent nations, there is no author- 
ized organ for us to treat with — no one man has authority 
to give up the rebellion for any other man. We simply 
must begin with and mold from disorganized and dis- 
cordant elements. Nor is it a small additional em- 
barrassment that we, the loyal people, differ among 
ourselves as to the mode, manner, and measure of 
reconstruction. As a general rule, I abstain from read- 
ing the reports of attacks upon myself, wishing not to 
be provoked by that to which I cannot properly offer 
an answer. In spite of this precaution, however, it 
comes to my knowledge that I am much censured for 
some supposed agency in setting up and seeking to 
sustain the new state government of Louisiana. In 
this I have done just so much as, and no more than, 
the public knows. In the Annual Message of December, 
1863, and in the accompanying proclamation, I presented 
a plan of reconstruction, as the phrase goes, which I 
promised, if adopted by any state, should be acceptable 
to and sustained by the executive government of the 
nation. I distinctly stated that this was not the only 
plan which might possibly be acceptable, and I also 



420 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

distinctly protested that the Executive claimed no right 
to say when or whether members should be admitted to 
seats in Congress from such states. This plan was in 
advance submitted to the then cabinet, and distinctly 
approved by every member of it. One of them sug- 
gested that I should then and in that connection apply 
the Emancipation Proclamation to the theretofore ex- 
cepted parts of Virginia and Louisiana; that I should 
drop the suggestion about apprenticeship for freed 
people^ and that I should omit the protest against my 
own power in regard to the admission of members to 
Congress. But even he approved everj'^ part and parcel 
of the plan which has since been employed or touched 
by the action of Louisiana. 

The new constitution of Louisiana, declaring emanci- 
pation for the whole state, practically applies the procla- 
mation to the part previously excepted. It does not 
adopt apprenticeship for freed people, and it is silent, 
as it could not well be otherwise, about the admission 
of members to Congress. So that, as it applied to 
Louisiana, every member of the cabinet fully approved 
the plan. The message went to Congress, and I re- 
ceived many commendations of the plan, written and 
verbal, and not a single objection to it from any pro- 
fessed emancipationist came to my knowledge until after 
the news reached Washington that the people of Louisiana 
had begun to move in accordance with it. From about 
July, 1862, I had corresponded with different persons 
supposed to be interested fin] seeking a reconstruction 
of a state government for Louisiana. When the message 
of 1863, with the plan before mentioned, reached New 
Orleans, General Banks wrote me that he was confident 
that the people, with his military cooperation, would 
reconstruct substantially on that plan. I wrote to him 
and some of them to try it. They tried it, and the 
result is known. Such has been my only agency in get- 
ting up the Louisiana government. As to sustaining it, 



a 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 421 

.V promise is out, as before stated. But as bad promises 
are better broken than kept, I shall treat this as a bad 
promise, and break it whenever I shall be convinced 
that keeping it is adverse to the public interest; but I 
have not yet been so convinced. I have been shown a 
letter on this subject, supposed to be an able one, in 
which the writer expresses regret that my mind has not 
seemed to be definitely fixed on the question whether the 
seceded states, so called, are in the Union or out of it. 
It would perhaps add astonishment to his regret were 
he to learn that since I have found professed Union 
men endeavoring to make that question, I have pur- 
posely forborne any public expression upon it. ^ As 
appears to me, that question has not been, nor yet is, a 
l^ractically material one, and that any discussion of it, 
while it thus remains practically immaterial, could have 
no effect other than the mischievous one of dividing our 
friends. As yet, whatever it may hereafter become, that 
question is bad as the basis of a controversy, and good 
for nothing at all— a merely pernicious abstraction. 
We all agree that the seceded states, so called, are out 
of their proper practioal relation with the Union, and 
that the sole object of the government, civil and military, 
in regard to those states is to again get them into that 
proper practical relation. I believe that it is not only 
possible, but in fact easier, to do this without deciding 
or even considering whether these states have ever been 
out of the Union, than with it. Finding themselves safely 
at home, it would be utterly immaterial whether they 
had ever been abroad. Let us all join in doing the acts 
necessary to restoring the proper practical relations be- 
tween these states and the Union, and each forever after 
innocentlv indulge his own opinion whether in doing the 
acts he brought the states from without into the Union, 
or onlv gave them proper assistance, they never having 
been out of it. The amount of constituency, so to speak 
on which the new Louisiana government rests, would 



422 SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 

be more satisfactor}^ to all if it contained 50,000 or 
30,000, or even 20,000, instead of only about 12,000, 
as it does. It is also unsatisfactory to some that the 
elective franchise is not given to the colored man. I 
would myself prefer that it were now conferred on the 
very intelligent, and on those who serve our cause as 
soldiers. Still, the question is not whether the Louisiana 
government, as it stands, is quite all that is desirable. 
The question is. Will it be wiser to take it as it is and 
help to improve it, or to reject and disperse it.'* Can 
Louisiana be brought into proper practical relation with 
the Union sooner by sustaining or by discarding her 
new state government.^ Some 12,000 voters in the 
heretofore slave state of Louisiana have sworn allegiance 
to the Union, assumed to be the rightful political power 
of the state, held elections, organized a state govern- 
ment, adopted a free state constitution, giving the benefit 
of public schools equally to black and white, and em- 
powering the legislature to confer the elective franchise 
upon the colored man. Their legislature has already 
voted to ratify the constitutional amendment recently 
passed by Congress, abolishing slavery throughout the 
nation. These 12,000 persons are thus fully committed 
to the Union and to perpetual freedom in the state — - 
committed to the very things, and nearly all the things, 
the nation wants — and they ask the nation's recognition 
and its assistance to make good their committal. 

Now, if we reject and spurn them, we do our utmost 
to disorganize and disperse them. We, in effect, say 
to the white man : You are worthless, or worse ; we will 
neither help you nor be helped by you. To the blacks 
we say: This cup of liberty which these, your old 
masters, hold to your lips we will dash from you, and 
leave you to the chances of gathering the spilled and 
scattered contents in some vague and undefined when, 
where, and how. If this course, discouraging and 
paralyzing both white and black, has any tendency to 



SELECTIONS FROM LINCOLN 423 

bring Louisiana into proper practical relations with the 
Lnion. I have so far been unable to perceive it. If, on 
the contrary, we recognize and sustain the new govern- 
ment of Louisiana, the converse of all this is made true. 
We encourage the hearts and nerve the arms of the 
12,000 to adhere to their work, and argue for it, and 
proselyte for it, and fight for it, and feed it, and grow 
it, and ripen it to a complete success. The colored man, 
too, in seeing all united for him, is inspired with vigilance, 
and energy, and daring, to the same end. Grant that 
he desires the elective franchise, vsrill he not attain it 
sooner by saving the already advanced steps toward it 
than by running backward over them.^ Concede that 
the new government of Louisiana is only to what it 
should be as the egg is to the fowl, we shall sooner 
have the fowl by hatching the egg than by smashing it. 
Again, if we reject Louisiana we also reject one vote 
in favor of the proposed amendment to the national 
Constitution. To meet this proposition it has been 
argued that no more than three-fourths of those states 
which have not attempted secession are necessary to 
validly ratify the amendment. I do not commit myself 
against this further than to say that such a ratification 
would be questionable, and sure to be persistently ques- 
tioned, while a ratification by three-fourths of all the 
states would be unquestioned and unquestionable. J 
repeat the question: Can Louisiana be brought into 
proper practical relation with the Union sooner by sus- 
taining or by discarding her new state government? 
What has been said of Louisiana will apply generally 
to other states. And yet so great peculiarities pertain 
to each state, and such important and sudden changes 
occur in the same state, and withal so new and un- 
precedented is the whole case that no exclusive and 
inflexible plan can safely b^ prescribed as to details and 
collaterals. Such exclusive and inflexible plan would 
surely become a new entanglement. Important prin- 



424 SELECTIONS FRO.M LTNXOLN 

ciples may and must be inflexible. In the present situ- 
ation, as the phrase goes, it ma}' be my duty to make 
some new announcement to the people of the South. I 
am considering, and shall not fail to act when satisfied 
that action will be proper. 



The last letter Lincoln M-rote was filled with the same 
thought of reconciliation. 

TO GENERAL VAN ALEN 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, April 14, 1865 
General Van Alen: I intend to adopt the advice 
of my friends and use due precautions. ... I thank 
you for the assurance you give me that I shall be sup- 
ported by conservative men like yourself, in the efforts 
I may make to restore the Union, so as to make it, to 
use your language, a Union of hearts and hands as well 
as of states. 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln 

On the same night he was shot in Ford's Theater, and in 
the early morning of April 15, he was, in Stanton's expressive 
words, "with the ages." 



